[tex-live] "tlmgr remove arch" equivalent?

[George N. White III]

On Sat, Aug 8, 2009 at 8:50 AM, Norbert Preining<preining at logic.at> wrote:
> On Sa, 08 Aug 2009, Markus Ueberall wrote:
>> the equivalent of the non-existent (not-yet-existent? ;)) tlmgr option
>> "tlmgr remove <arch>"?
>
> Good question, unfortunately that is not banal, that is the reason
> why I haven't implemented it.
>
> Well, in principle you have to:
> - remove bin/$ARCH
> - changes to tlpkg/texlive.tlpdb:
>  . remove all stanzas
>        xxxxxx.$ARCH
>  . remove in 00texlive.installation $ARCH from
>        depend setting_available_architectures: ....
> - (not essential) remove tlpkg/installer/xz/xz*.$ARCH
>
> Can be done in tlmgr, but I was toooo lazy till now.

I don't see this as lower priority than making the installer
more robust to network problems.

I used to install (e.g, from the .iso images) for all our
platforms using linux, then copy the tree to the various
systems using: rsync --exclude=<other archs>.

When the package manager arrived I edited
tlpkg/texlive.tlpdb to suit.  Now we have more Apple than
linux, so use MacTeX and I just provide a local mirror so we
can do installs without running into network glitches.

Use case:  scientist has laptop with linux+TL<current> travels to
another lab to work on a report.  Coauthors at other lab have tetex
from their distro but decide they want TL<current> -- much time
lost unable to get the network install to work.  Now I know to include
a snapshot of our archive mirror on the data disks that generally go
with travellers (along with the linux distro's install/rescue .iso image!).

-- 
George N. White III <aa056 at chebucto.ns.ca>
Head of St. Margarets Bay, Nova Scotia