Discussion:
[tex-live] Missing files in "comprehensive"
jack
2018-01-10 08:35:02 UTC
Permalink
After a "tlmgr update", it looks like the "comprehensive" package is
missing the PDF file called "symbols-letter.pdf".

I hope this is an accidental oversight and not on purpose. Its twin
"symbols-a4.pdf" (which is still there) is inconvenient for those of us in
the USA, and also, on a laptop screen it's too small to comfortably read
when zoomed in such a way that the whole page is on the screen at once.

It looks like nothing else changed in the package except the removal of
two other PDF files.

-Jack
Herbert Schulz
2018-01-10 13:52:34 UTC
Permalink
Post by jack
After a "tlmgr update", it looks like the "comprehensive" package is
missing the PDF file called "symbols-letter.pdf".
I hope this is an accidental oversight and not on purpose. Its twin
"symbols-a4.pdf" (which is still there) is inconvenient for those of us in
the USA, and also, on a laptop screen it's too small to comfortably read
when zoomed in such a way that the whole page is on the screen at once.
It looks like nothing else changed in the package except the removal of
two other PDF files.
-Jack
Howdy,

With a fully updated TeX Live 2017 I see that document when I run `texdoc -l symbols` and it opens successfully when I choose it.

Good Luck,

Herb Schulz
(herbs at wideopenwest dot com)
Herbert Schulz
2018-01-10 14:22:58 UTC
Permalink
Post by jack
After a "tlmgr update", it looks like the "comprehensive" package is
missing the PDF file called "symbols-letter.pdf".
I hope this is an accidental oversight and not on purpose. Its twin
"symbols-a4.pdf" (which is still there) is inconvenient for those of us in
the USA, and also, on a laptop screen it's too small to comfortably read
when zoomed in such a way that the whole page is on the screen at once.
It looks like nothing else changed in the package except the removal of
two other PDF files.
-Jack
Howdy,

Sigh... after this morning's update the document does seem to be missing.

Good Luck,

Herb Schulz
(herbs at wideopenwest dot com)
Karl Berry
2018-01-10 21:39:24 UTC
Permalink
I removed it to make more space on the DVD, which is pretty much
overfull already.

It's not make or break to put it back, but in these days of arbitrarily
magnifiable electronic documents, I don't understand the need to also
have the letter over having just the a4. Your explanations didn't make
sense to me, sorry. (I doubted anyone printed it out on an actual
printer, and for that, the -letter.pdf on CTAN should suffice anyway.)

E.g., I long ago set up my PDF viewer for texdoc to default to just
fitting to the window size, since there are tons of both a4 and letter
pdfs in TL.

If all other things were equal, I'd certainly include them both, but all
other things aren't equal. -k

P.S. I have to remove more platform binary sets from the DVD only
(they'll still be available for normal network install), as we started
doing last year. I also removed the premade pst-geo examples/*.pdf files
for the same reason.
Siep Kroonenberg
2018-01-10 21:49:56 UTC
Permalink
Post by Karl Berry
I removed it to make more space on the DVD, which is pretty much
overfull already.
It's not make or break to put it back, but in these days of arbitrarily
magnifiable electronic documents, I don't understand the need to also
have the letter over having just the a4. Your explanations didn't make
sense to me, sorry. (I doubted anyone printed it out on an actual
printer, and for that, the -letter.pdf on CTAN should suffice anyway.)
E.g., I long ago set up my PDF viewer for texdoc to default to just
fitting to the window size, since there are tons of both a4 and letter
pdfs in TL.
If all other things were equal, I'd certainly include them both, but all
other things aren't equal. -k
P.S. I have to remove more platform binary sets from the DVD only
(they'll still be available for normal network install), as we started
doing last year. I also removed the premade pst-geo examples/*.pdf files
for the same reason.
What about only including recommended fonts next time?
--
Siep Kroonenberg
jack
2018-01-10 22:25:27 UTC
Permalink
Your explanations didn't make sense to
me, sorry. (I doubted anyone printed it out on an actual printer, and for
that, the -letter.pdf on CTAN should suffice anyway.)
If nobody printed it anyway, then the size to keep is the one that makes
on-screen viewing easiest. That is symbols-letter.pdf.

Because A4 paper is taller than letter paper, if an A4 PDF is zoomed in
such a way that the whole page is on the screen---so that one doesn't have
to scroll up or down---the page contents must be smaller and harder to see
than they would be under letter size. On a 13-inch laptop, that ends up
being painfully small. (It's awfully small already even with letter-size,
but it's doable.)

-Jack
Karl Berry
2018-01-12 00:48:26 UTC
Permalink
Ok, I understand now. I'm not adamantly opposed I guess, but a plethora,
I suspect the majority, of package documentation PDFs in TL are a4. That
is why I chose to keep that format. So whatever the situation with a4,
it seems you and everyone else must have already solved it as well as it
can be solved. Maybe providing the document with a larger font size is
the least bad answer ... Scott? -k
jack
2018-01-12 05:29:50 UTC
Permalink
Post by Karl Berry
Ok, I understand now. I'm not adamantly opposed I guess, but a plethora,
I suspect the majority, of package documentation PDFs in TL are a4. That
is why I chose to keep that format. So whatever the situation with a4, it
seems you and everyone else must have already solved it as well as it can
be solved. Maybe providing the document with a larger font size is the
least bad answer ... Scott? -k
A larger font size is probably a bad idea, since it will likely force
inconvenient pagebreaks in the middle of some blocks of symbols. (Not to
mention, it will make an already large pagecount even bigger, which makes
flipping through them less efficient.)

I hadn't realized at first that symbols-letter.pdf will remain on CTAN.
I'll just get it from there and keep it locally.

-Jack

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