xii and xii-lat

[Peter Wilson]

Recently David Carlisle has released his xii-lat.tex file (see TUGboat
38,3) as a follow on from xii.tex. Both of these files are part of
TeXlive but when I tried to process them (by pdftex) they were not
found. Eventually with help from TEX.SE
(https://tex.stackexchange.com/questions/407065) I discovered that they
were under \usr\local\texlive\2017\texmf-dist\doc\plain. I feel that the
TDS should be organized in this case so that pdftex xii will produce
xii.pdf (and similarly for xii-lat or other (La)TeX files of the same
nature).

Perhaps a new category called, say, fun, could be developed for these
kind of files?

Peter W.

[Norbert Preining]

\usr\local\texlive\2017\texmf-dist\doc\plain. I feel that the TDS should be
organized in this case so that pdftex xii will produce xii.pdf (and
similarly for xii-lat or other (La)TeX files of the same nature).

Not very good idea. It would add sooooo many files to the search space, with
a high probability of file name clashes etc. No, doc files will not be
automatically searched by kpathsea. They (the doc files) *are* different
beasts and not supposed to be input files *unless* you want to typeset
the documentation.

Norbert

--
PREINING Norbert http://www.preining.info
Accelia Inc. + JAIST + TeX Live + Debian Developer
GPG: 0x860CDC13 fp: F7D8 A928 26E3 16A1 9FA0 ACF0 6CAC A448 860C DC13

[Karl Berry]

Hi Peter - I understand the desire. I put xii and xii-lat into doc
precisely because I felt like anyone who wanted to typeset those files
could find them as part of the fun. It's not like they are needed to do
any typesetting. In general, all example/demo/fun files are in doc.
It's obviously no big deal for two files, but ... such was my reasoning.
Wdyt? -k

P.S. DavidC: wdyt about combining the two "packages"? I surmise the
package infrastructure overwhelms the size of the actual files
.. whatever, no biggie.

[David Carlisle]

I think doc is fine really.

Is it possible to make
texdoc xii
work (show the pdf) if it's in doc? that might be a slight improvement
but if not I'd leave things as they are.

I wondered about adding the new one into the existing xii package in
ctan but they would have wanted updating package dates etc and I quite
liked having old dates in the xii area so I think a new package is
fine.
It doesn't really need to be in texlive at all (not that it _needs_ to
be on ctan either:-)

David

Post by Karl Berry
Hi Peter - I understand the desire. I put xii and xii-lat into doc
precisely because I felt like anyone who wanted to typeset those files
could find them as part of the fun. It's not like they are needed to do
any typesetting. In general, all example/demo/fun files are in doc.
It's obviously no big deal for two files, but ... such was my reasoning.
Wdyt? -k
P.S. DavidC: wdyt about combining the two "packages"? I surmise the
package infrastructure overwhelms the size of the actual files
.. whatever, no biggie.

[Peter Wilson]

Hi Karl,

Thanks for your thoughts and, as ever, your ongoing efforts.

Another (unwanted and probably undesirable) suggestion. Could another
subdirectory be added to doc/plain as /doc/plain/fun? xii and xii-lat
could be put into this as well as, say, happy4th, and any others of the
same ilk

With best wishes to everybody for the Holiday Season and 2018.

Peter W.

Post by Karl Berry
Hi Peter - I understand the desire. I put xii and xii-lat into doc
precisely because I felt like anyone who wanted to typeset those files
could find them as part of the fun. It's not like they are needed to do
any typesetting. In general, all example/demo/fun files are in doc.
It's obviously no big deal for two files, but ... such was my reasoning.
Wdyt? -k
P.S. DavidC: wdyt about combining the two "packages"? I surmise the
package infrastructure overwhelms the size of the actual files
.. whatever, no biggie.

[Karl Berry]

texdoc xii work (show the pdf)

No, because there is no xii*pdf in TL or CTAN.

if not I'd leave things as they are.

Ack.

I wondered about adding the new one into the existing xii package

Ack.

Thanks,
Karl

[David Carlisle]

Post by Karl Berry
No, because there is no xii*pdf in TL or CTAN.

that is for the best, I agree. Having gone to to the trouble to write
such ---obfuscated--- clear code, I didn't want to make it _too_ easy
for people to get the pdf output:-)

[Karl Berry]

Hi Peter - Sorry, but I resist. Experience has shown that subdirectory
levels are not the best way to differentiate content-level things,
because there are too many ways to do it. The subdirectories now are by
format/program and then by package and that's it. Simplicity is good.

To achieve the purpose, there are keywords ("topics") maintained in the
CTAN catalogue, and tlmgr info searches them, among other things:

$ tlmgr info frivolous
..
Packages containing `frivolous' in their title/description:
happy4th - A firework display in obfuscated TeX
pst-fun - Draw "funny" objects with PSTricks
reverxii - Playing Reversi in TeX
xii - Christmas silliness (English)
xii-lat - Christmas silliness (Latin)
..

https://ctan.org/topics/cloud shows all such topics (there are tons).

best,
karl