[tex-live] some remarks

[Vladimir Volovich]

"KB" == Karl Berry writes:

 KB>        as far as i understand, this is because lcdf-typetools
 KB> build process does not use the "libstdc++ hack" used elsewhere to
 KB> link statically with libstdc++. hopefully it will be fixed...

 KB> Funny, I thought that was in there.  Will have to look.
 KB> Meanwhile, it's no worse than it was last year.

i re-submitted lcdf-typetools binaries for sparc-solaris which link
statically to libstdc++. (manually changed LIBS in Makefile)

 KB>     2) xdvi-motif.bin links to libiconv.so.2 which is again
 KB> absent in

 KB> libiconv was a hassle for Solaris users last year.  I don't think
 KB> it is actually necessary or used in xdvi, it's pulled in by some
 KB> sequence of libraries.

in fact it seems to be used by some code in xdvi. anyway, i re-built
and re-submitted xdvi to not link with libiconv.so.2 (it uses
system-provided iconv functions).

 KB>     4) pkfix uses a wild and ugly hack in it's first 2 lines to
 KB> run perl,

 KB> That wild and ugly hack has actually been the standard way to
 KB> invoke Perl from something that might be interpreted by either
 KB> perl or sh ever since Perl was invented.  No change needed.

why not change this last beast to use much more elegant approach which
is used by all other perl scripts in TeX Live?

 KB>     5) texi2html contains a compile-time path of perl - which
 KB> shall be replaced with "#!/usr/bin/env perl" too

 KB> Yes.  Sigh.  I still don't know why we bother with the Texinfo
 KB> programs.  texi2html in particular has zilch to do with TeX.  Why
 KB> do we have it?

well, we have other stuff like t4ht, so why not have texi2html? it's
only that the first line needs to be changed.

Best,
v.