HMC Mathematics Computing Weblog

TeX Live 2010 Is Linux Default TeX System

TeX Live 2010 is now the current TeX system on the Linux systems. We had been running TeX Live 2009 until the end of the semester. Macs continue to run a MacTeX containing TeX Live 2009; I have high hopes that we will be able to move to TeX Live 2011 across the cluster before the fall semester begins.

TeX Live 2011 Pretest

We currently have a pretest install of the TeX Live 2011 distribution (Release Notes) available for testing. TL 2011 is under active development, so at any given time it might have problems that you won't see in TL 2009 or TL 2010. The developers welcome bug reports, but if you find a problem, please let me know before you file a report. I will update the distribution to make sure we have the latest version and let you know; you can then try your document again to see if the problem still exists.

TL 2011 is aiming for a release by July, and based on last year, I think that it will be ready for us to use in the fall semester. (I used TL 2010 throughout the year with no real problems.)

If you want to try TeX Live 2011 for yourself (on Linux or Mac systems), you can add the path to the binaries to the head of your PATH. I recommend that you do not add the path in your startup files so that you will get a known working version of TeX by default and get back to it by logging out and back in (or by closing the terminal window where you set the PATH).

You'll need to set the right architecture to make things work; I recommend you run one of the following commands to set the PATH correctly:

For the tcsh or csh:

setenv PATH /shared/local/texlive/2011/bin/`uname -i`-linux:$PATH

For bash, sh, zsh, or other Bourne/Korn shells:

export PATH="/shared/local/texlive/2011/bin/`uname -i`-linux:$PATH"

[uname -i will expand to the appropriate architecture for the machine you're logged into; either i386 (for 32-bit machines) or x86_64code> (for 64-bit machines).]

For Macs, for the tcsh or csh:

setenv PATH /shared/local/texlive/2011/bin/universal-darwin:$PATH

For bash, sh, zsh, or other Bourne/Korn shells:

export PATH="/shared/local/texlive/2011/bin/universal-darwin:$PATH"

Note that setting your PATH in this way will not affect the PATH used by applications such as TeXShop, only the Terminal session in which you set it. You can set the path in the Engine tab of the TeXShop Preferences dialog, and reset your preferences to defaults using the drop-down menu in the bottom-left corner of that dialog. (Resetting your preferences using this method may change other preferences besides the paths-be sure to check.)