For Mister Karl Berry, requesting assistance concerning some so-called “orphaned” texlive-… software packages in my 64-bit, openSUSE, Leap-15.4, Linux installation following an upgrade from an openSUSE, Leap-15.3, installation of a Linux operating system

Lawrence Patrick Somerville spring2014day at gmail.com
Wed Sep 21 05:21:17 CEST 2022


Hello, Mister Karl Berry. I have been obtaining software packages which
probably originated in some versions of Teχ Live via the openSUSE or
OpenSUSE distribution of a Linux operating system since at least December
of the year 2013 when I began using Oracle VM (Virtual Machine) VirtualBox
in a Windows operating system on a then-new, 64-bit notebook computer and
having my openSUSE operating system as a VM in VirtualBox. And in recent
years I have been upgrading my openSUSE Leap distribution of a Linux
operating system about once a year with updates to texlive-… software
packages subsequently installed from openSUSE, Leap, online software
repositories. After upgrading Leap, version 15.3 to Leap, version 15.4 in
June of the year 2022 I found that I had the following list of texlive-…
software packages which were categorized as “orphaned,” meaning that
software packages with the following names were no longer being supplied
through any openSUSE, Leap-15.4, online repository. Notice that the
“orphaned” texlive-… software packages below are labeled with probably the
year 2017. For example, texlive-mychemistry was installed in July of the
year 2021. So I probably obtained that version of texlive-chemistry, which
I supposed may have originated as a part of Teχ Live 2017, via an openSUSE
online repository while I had Leap 15.3 installed in VirtualBox. Since on
September 9, 2022, for example, no newer version of texlive-mychemistry was
offered for installation from an openSUSE online repository for Leap 15.4,
I guess that the software package texlive-mychemistry might have been
discontinued beginning with some version of Teχ Live during the interval of
years 2018-2021. In contrast in my present, Leap-15.4 installation most of
my installed texlive... software packages appear to have come from Teχ Live
2021.


*Questions: *Despite the problems with the coronavirus in the world, were Teχ
Live 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 all produced? If not, which versions of Teχ
Live during the years 2018-2021 were not produced?


*A question:* If Teχ Live 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 were all produced, can
you refer me to, for example, some so-called “changelogs” for Teχ Live
2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 which would list the Teχ Live software packages
which would be discontinued from the previously issued version of Teχ Live?


I have probably many texlive... software packages installed in my Leap-15.4
installation which I have not been using in Leap-15.4 or even in some
earlier versions of openSUSE. It is even conceivable that some Teχ Live
2017 software packages obtained via some earlier version of openSUSE might
still work in my Leap-15.4 installation and therefore should not be removed
due to being non-functional. Of course I would prefer to avoid problems
caused by removing software packages; yet when such a removal would not
cause problems for the rest of my installed computer software, I would be
in favor of such a removal to avoid wasteful storage of computer software
and to eliminate software which might even be unusable in my Leap-15.4
installation. On September 13, 2022 below were my results for “orphaned,”
just texlive-… software packages in my Leap 15.4 installation when I was
probably using the Linux kernel version 5.14.21-150400.24.18-default (I
removed all of the other “orphaned” software packages from my Leap-15.4
installation.).


S | Repository | Name | Version | Arch

---+------------+--------------------------------------+---------------------------------+-------

i+ | @System | texlive-babel-spanglish | 2017.135.0.0.3svn37629-6.16 |
noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-babel-spanglish-doc | 2017.135.0.0.3svn37629-6.16 |
noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-bezos | 2017.133.svn25507-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-bezos-doc | 2017.133.svn25507-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-einfuehrung | 2017.133.svn29349-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-einfuehrung2 | 2017.133.svn39153-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-FAQ-en | 2017.133.3.28svn34303-6.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-genmisc | 2017.133.svn27208-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-geometry-de | 2017.133.1.1svn21882-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-ifetex | 2017.133.1.2svn24853-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-ifetex-doc | 2017.133.1.2svn24853-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-ifxetex | 2017.133.0.0.6svn19685-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-ifxetex-doc | 2017.133.0.0.6svn19685-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-knuth | 2017.133.svn32899-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-knuth-doc | 2017.133.svn32899-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-latex-bib-ex | 2017.133.svn25831-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-latex-bib2-ex | 2017.133.svn40098-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-latex-referenz | 2017.137.2svn36671-7.6.4 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-latex-tabellen | 2017.137.svn16979-7.6.4 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-lua2dox | 2017.133.0.0.2svn29349-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-lua2dox-bin | 2017.20170520.svn29053-19.4 | x86_64

i+ | @System | texlive-lua2dox-doc | 2017.133.0.0.2svn29349-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-math-e | 2017.133.svn20062-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-mychemistry | 2017.133.1.99bsvn28611-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-mychemistry-doc | 2017.133.1.99bsvn28611-5.18 |
noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-presentations | 2017.133.svn43949-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-presentations-en | 2017.133.svn29803-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-spanish-mx | 2017.133.1.1asvn15878-4.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-spanish-mx-doc | 2017.133.1.1asvn15878-4.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-sympytexpackage | 2017.133.svn41190-4.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-sympytexpackage-doc | 2017.133.svn41190-4.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-tabulars-e | 2017.134.1.0svn21191-5.18 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-wasy2-ps | 2017.136.svn35830-10.15 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-wasy2-ps-doc | 2017.136.svn35830-10.15 | noarch

i+ | @System | texlive-wasy2-ps-fonts | 2017.136.svn35830-10.15 | noarch


I would like to know whether any of above, “orphaned,” texlive-… software
packages would be functional in my Leap-15.4 installation or not. Possibly
relating to this question, I found indications from
*https://www.educba.com/linux-distributions/
<https://www.educba.com/linux-distributions/>* and
*https://www.texdev.net/2011/10/29/tex-live-in-linux-distributions/
<https://www.texdev.net/2011/10/29/tex-live-in-linux-distributions/>* on
the Internet that a version of a texlive-… software package provided via a
distributor of a Linux operating system might possibly be kernel dependent.
Then in Yet another Software Tool (YaST) Software for the package named
“texlive” I saw that its version number included both “2021” for probably
the year of Teχ Live and “150400”, which was part of my then-running Linux
kernel version of probably “5.14.21-150400.24.18-default”! And that same
number of “150400” appears in numerous other texlive-… software package
version numbers which also include the number “2021” in them. So I suppose
that many texlive-… software packages in my Leap-15.4 installation with
both “2021” and “150400” in their version numbers may be dependent on at
least the current series of Linux kernels which include “150400” in their
version numbers. Similarly among a large number of the “orphaned,”
texlive-… software packages in my Leap-15.4 installation I found that their
version numbers include both “2017” and “5.18” in their version numbers.
And among them, for example texlive-knuth and texlive-tabulars-e, were
installed in my Leap-15.4 installation on July 13, 2021 when I was using
Leap 15.3. And in my former Leap-15.3 installation I was usually, if not
always using Linux kernels with “5.3.18” in their version numbers. So I
suppose that all members of that set of “orphaned,” texlive-… software
packages were kernel dependent. For the remaining 10, “orphaned” texlive-…
sofware packages which all have “2017” in their version numbers, but not
“5.18” in their version numbers, all ten of them were installed on July 13,
2021 in my then, Leap-15.3 installation.


So here is what I suppose or speculate that openSUSE developers might have
been doing concerning texlive-... software packages: a) obtaining them in
primitive forms, perhaps as source-code files from Teχ Live from the Teχ
Users Group (TUG) or perhaps the Comprehensive Teχ Archive Network (CTAN),
b) perhaps modifying them in ways to make them usable in the latest version
of openSUSE with its Linux kernels, possibly backporting some
kernel-appropriate computer code; and c) providing such a modified software
package in an openSUSE, online repository. In anticipation of the types of
content to be used in Linux kernels in Leap 15.4 perhaps those so-produced,
texlive-… software packages did not need to be compiled at the time of
their installations, but instead might have been released from an online
openSUSE repository having already been compiled. In an openSUSE online
forum as of September 19 or 20, 2022 no one had confirmed or denied my
speculations in this paragraph. *Possibly help me here.*--You may correct
me if you know that any of my thinking in this paragraph and my previous
paragraph is incorrect.


Some relevance of part of my previous discussion to deciding whether or not
to remove “orphaned,” texlive-… software packages is that it is conceivable
that such texlive-… packages produced for use in one set of Linux kernels
used in my Leap-15.3 installation might not work in the Linux kernels in
and to be used in my Leap-15.4 installation; and if those “orphaned”
texlive-… software packages would turn out to not work in my Leap-15.4
installation, I should remove them from my Leap-15.4 installation.


There is a possibility that the function of an old texlive-… software
package from Teχ Live 2017 could have been replaced by a texlive-… software
package with a different name in a year-2018, 2019, 2020, or 2021 version
of Teχ Live; and if such a replacement of function was indeed made, the
old, “orphaned,” texlive-… software package should be removed from my
Leap-15.4 installation; and in that case in order to continue to have the
function of the old texlive-… software package in its replacement texlive-…
software package, I should install that replacing texlive-… software
package in my Leap-15.4 installation, assuming that a Leap-15.4, online,
software repository would supply it. An imaginable way that such a
possibility might be checked might be to scan the so-called “changelogs”
for the year-2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021 versions of Teχ Live, if they were
all thoroughly produced and can be found somewhere online.


*A question:* If so, can you refer me to any online, complete “changelogs”
for Teχ Live 2018, 2019, 2020, and/or 2021 which will enable me to
determine whether the function of my “orphaned” texlive-… software packages
has been replaced by any texlive-… software packages with new or different
names than my installed, “orphaned,” texlive-... software packages?


To somehow learn how to work with each of 35, relatively old,“orphaned,”
texlive-… software packages and afterward to test each of them, one at a
time, in a LaTeχ, .tex file using one or both of the computer programs
pdflatex and/or bibtex might take a large amount of time!


*A question:* So instead is there a way I may determine en masse, or in a
group, whether each of the installed “orphaned” texlive-... packages will
be functional or not in my Leap-15.4 installation, perhaps in a short .tex
file which would include a \usepackage{…} statement and between those
braces have all of the “orphaned” texlive-... package names minus
“texlive-” in each case and separated by commas?
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