Re: TeXLive and ConTeXt

[Hans Hagen <j.hagen@xs4all.nl>]

On 6/6/2018 4:54 PM, Otared Kavian wrote:
> Hi all,
> 
> I would like to report (with a rather bad humor) on an issue regarding the use of ConTeXt when one starts with TeXLive.
> 
> Last week I was at a meeting of mathematicians and several people asked me to explain why I am using ConTeXt rather than LaTeX, and show them some of the features which (according to me) are fundamentally better thought and better designed.
> 
> When some of my colleagues were convinced with what I showed them, since they had already a version of TeXLive installed on their computer, they wanted to try out ConTeXt on their own. So we tried to make some tests with their own installation of TeXLive and ConTeXt on their machine, and this is when the troubles began, because none of them could run ConTeXt out of the box…
> 
> I confess that I am not at all a geek and my knowledge of ConTeXt is rather elementary, and just sufficient for my own (elementary) needs, therefore I could not solve the problems preventing those people to use ConTeXt.
> However, as those people told me, when using LaTeX they don't need any further technical knowledge, since any file can be typeset out of the box with an installation of TeXLive.
> 
> So here is my frustrated question: why we cannot typeset a file « test.tex » written in TeX and using ConTeXt commands just by saying
> 	context test.tex
> in a terminal window (nor using a GUI front end) while one would be able to do that if that file were written using LaTeX commands?

last week someone was sitting next to me who tried that and it just 
worked ... ok, installing the whole of tex live took a while

(btw, when you install the lot there is an issue with the speed of 
making the file database .. somehow it's quite slow compared to the 
garden variant)

> I know that it is possible to search on the web and find an answer regarding the steps one should take to enable ConTeXt from TeXLive, but it is not natural to expect people come to ConTeXt if they cannot use it out of the box. By the way, just for testing I installed TeXLive 2018, and could not use ConTeXt out of the box… (and I don't remember what I should do to enable it…).
> 
> Indeed it is always possible to install a standalone version of ConTeXt on one's machine, but this pushes us to behave like a sect in the TeX community.

just come up with arguments like:

- it's small and installs easily
- you can also update to the latest greatest
- it doesn't interfere with existing tex live(s)
- that includes the just released fonts
- it's also faster

> I don't know to whom I should write to have ConTeXt enabled in TeXLive when one installs it: can anyone give me a hint?

probably to Mojca

> Best regards to all of you, especially those who do an incredible lot of work to develop ConTeXt and, who deserve to be better known among TeX users.
> Otared K.
> ___________________________________________________________________________________
> If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to the Wiki!
> 
> maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl / http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
> webpage  : http://www.pragma-ade.nl / http://context.aanhet.net
> archive  : https://bitbucket.org/phg/context-mirror/commits/
> wiki     : http://contextgarden.net
> ___________________________________________________________________________________
> 


-- 

-----------------------------------------------------------------
                                           Hans Hagen | PRAGMA ADE
               Ridderstraat 27 | 8061 GH Hasselt | The Netherlands
        tel: 038 477 53 69 | www.pragma-ade.nl | www.pragma-pod.nl
-----------------------------------------------------------------
___________________________________________________________________________________
If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to the Wiki!

maillist : ntg-context@ntg.nl / http://www.ntg.nl/mailman/listinfo/ntg-context
webpage  : http://www.pragma-ade.nl / http://context.aanhet.net
archive  : https://bitbucket.org/phg/context-mirror/commits/
wiki     : http://contextgarden.net
___________________________________________________________________________________