[pdftex] PTEX.FileName contains file system information

[James Quirk]

On Tue, 7 Aug 2007, Taco Hoekwater wrote:

> Hans Hagen wrote:
> > Peter Schmitt wrote:
> > 
> >> Upward compatibilty is very important, but it should not be a dogma:
> >> In a case like this -- which does not even concern the typesetting --
> >> adding a switch (either a commandline switch or a primitive to be set)
> >> should be considered as correcting a bug (an oversight), and
> >> the default setting should be the more cautious choice.
> >> (A message in the logfile could be added.)
> > 
> > well, as mentioned before, it's not a bug nor an oversight (actually, 
> > adding full resource names has been very custom in publishing because it 
> > permitted to include a low res graphic to be replaced by a high res in 
> > the final stage), it's a feature present for a long time now; and now 
> > this feature can be disabled
> 
> My vote is with Martin and Hans. pdftex 1.50 it is.

If the requisite switch is provided and it can be added to a site 
configuration file, does it really matter one way or the other? 
The answer is "No" for experts who know of the existence of the switch 
and are fully able to tweak their setups. But as Stephan pointed out, 
for casual users the answer is likely "Yes". For they won't know
of the switch, or they won't feel comfortable tweaking their setup.
Therefore I think many pdftex users would side with Stephan and Peter. 
As for myself, I will accept whatever pdftex's developers are prepared
to support.

I do, however, have the following question. 

Why does PTEX use:

  /PTEX.FileName   <string> 
  /PTEX.PageNumber <number>
  /PTEX.InfoDict   <object ref>

rather than:

   /PTEX <<
      /FileName   <string>
      /PageNumber <number>
      /InfoDict   <object ref>
   >>

I would have thought the dictionary approach more in keeping with PDF's 
design, and it would certainly provide a cleaner path forward when adding 
new pieces of information to support custom post-processors and the like.  
Therefore I'm wondering was the dictionary approach specifically precluded 
by Adobe when Hans registered PTEX?  Certainly AR is not phased by the 
contents of a /PTEX dictionary, provided it is syntactically correct.
 
James