Re: How can I make a Gentoo Linux package for ConTeXt LMTX?

["amano.kenji via ntg-context" <ntg-context@ntg.nl>]

> https://tug.org/TUGboat/tb34-3/tb108preining-distro.pdf

Somebody needed to update TeX Live on Gentoo Linux. I'm going to read it.

> From a developer perspective, this is essentially just the base ConTeXt files, a modified texmfcnf.lua, and a fairly basic makefile.

I'm going to read https://github.com/vlasakm/context soon. Until then, I would feel confused and disoriented.

------- Original Message -------
On Tuesday, August 23rd, 2022 at 1:11 AM, Max Chernoff <mseven@telus.net> wrote:


> Hi Amano,
> 
> > Wuh. That's a bit complex.
> 
> 
> Not really. From a user perspective, all that you need to run is
> 
> make install
> 
> From a developer perspective, this is essentially just the base ConTeXt
> files, a modified texmfcnf.lua, and a fairly basic makefile.
> 
> > For distribution packages that depend on context for generation of PDF
> > documents, having context as a system package is essential.
> 
> 
> I'd say that ConTeXt is available in nearly every package manager, via
> TeX Live. Very very few package managers would have no TeX Live. TeX
> Live only includes MkIV, the "stable" version, but most users won't
> notice many differences from MkXL/LMTX, the "experimental" version.
> 
> By policy, TeX Live only updates its binaries once per year. This would
> be pretty much unworkable with LuaMetaTeX due to its frequent upgrades.
> At some point when LuaMetaTeX is stable, the source will be released and
> almost certainly be incorporated in TeX Live.
> 
> > And, distribution maintainers can make things work if they understand
> > TeX directory structure and texmfcnf.lua.
> 
> 
> Packaging/installing ConTeXt is actually much easier than doing so for
> other TeX systems. With other systems, you need to fiddle around with
> fonts and packages, but with ConTeXt, you can pretty much just unpack a
> few files.
> 
> Here's a short paper that should give you an overview of how hard
> packaging TeX can be:
> 
> https://tug.org/TUGboat/tb34-3/tb108preining-distro.pdf
> 
> > It comes down to care. If they care and they have installation guide,
> > they will make it work.
> 
> 
> I'm not sure who you're talking about here. If you're talking about end-
> users, then yes, it's pretty simple to install ConTeXt. I personally
> find ConTeXt much easier to install than TeX Live.
> 
> If you're talking about packagers, then packaging ConTeXt is no more
> complex than packaging TeX Live (which of course includes ConTeXt MkIV).
> The installer documentation for ConTeXt LMTX certainly isn't as detailed
> as it is for TeX Live, but LMTX is still beta software.
> 
> If you're trying to say that the ConTeXt developers don't care, then you
> may be "right" in a sense, but missing the point entirely. There is no
> one who is paid to work on ConTeXt: all of the developers work on it
> either as volunteers or to support their own business needs. The current
> installer works for them and for many other users. This isn't to say
> that they don't care about the users, but rather that they are unlikely
> to spend much time making a package for a fairly unpopular distro where
> the official installer already works.
> 
> > On Sunday, August 21st, 2022 at 7:13 PM, Michal Vlasák <lahcim8 at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> 
> Hi Michal,
> 
> > > I prepared a proof of concept, that I am ready to take down immediately
> > > at Hans' request, since I don't handle license information properly, and
> > > texmf-context is stripped down (just so that the downloads are not too
> > > big for proof of concept).
> > > 
> > > https://github.com/vlasakm/context
> 
> 
> That's quite impressive!
> 
> > > There is documentation about how it can be used. I hope its obvious how
> > > I got "texmf" (texmf-context.zip, unzip, delete some files I didn't want
> > > to take up space),
> 
> 
> One suggestion: instead of unpacking and committing "texmf-context.zip",
> I'd recommend adding
> 
> https://github.com/contextgarden/context-mirror/
> 
> as a git submodule. That way, it's easy to keep the files up-to-date, your
> repo will use less space, and there's a clearer separation between your
> package files and ConTeXt itself.
> 
> > > A bit of a disclaimer: I don't really recommend pursuing this further.
> > > Some time ago I was also that foolish to try to package TeX for Linux
> > > distributions. Unfortunately I think that the result will never by
> > > optimal - as demonstrated by the previous discussions, the usual
> > > purposes of packages (to integrate software into the system) don't apply
> > > much to TeX / ConTeXt - there one wants something more or less self
> > > contained (so that updates are under control, no random non-essential
> > > libraries brake things, etc.).
> 
> 
> Well packaging the files into .rpm/.deb isn't really a bad idea; what's
> bad is the weird modifications that distros make, plus the fact that
> nearly every distro delays updates by quite some time. I generally agree
> that installing TeX straight from the source is better, although I can
> see why some users prefer to install from their distro repos.
> 
> Thanks,
> -- Max
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