Re: [Axiom-developer] build-improvements and latex

[Ralf Hemmecke]

On 11/08/2006 04:00 PM, Gabriel Dos Reis wrote:
> "Page, Bill" <address@hidden> writes:
>
> | On Wednesday, November 08, 2006 8:19 AM Gaby wrote:
> | > ...
> | > Bill Page wrote:
> | > | In my opinion it is only an accident that axiom.sty.pamphlet
> | > | has this name and contains only one root chunk. In general this
> | > | is not the case.
> | > 
> | > The axiom.sty.pamphlet is inded very special.  Its purpose and
> | > its functionality are not the same like any others.  We should
> | > not forget that. 
> | > 
> | 
> | I don't understand. In what way is it special?
>
> It is self-referencing, and foundational to anything else for Axiom
> documentation, and therefore has a more intimate relationship with TeX
> than others. 

I still don't see a reason that makes axiom.sty.pamphlet special.
First one extracts any file via notangle (tex is completely irrelevant 
here). Then one transforms pamphlets to .tex files (tex is still 
irrelevant). Now you have all the generated files you need to start the 
latex process. From that point of view even axiom.sty is not special. 
There is no bootstrapping problem.

> | It seems to me the only peculiarity here is with the latex
> | command as reported by Waldek:
> | 
> | http://www.mail-archive.com/address@hidden/msg07222.html
> | 
> | that when given the command:
> | 
> |   \usepackage{axiom}
> | 
> | by default looks for
> | 
> |   axiom.sty.tex
> | 
> | in the current directory even though the common practice is to name
> | the file
> | 
> |   axiom.sty
> | 
> | and to locate it in the shared texmf file tree. To me this is
> | strange and unexpected. I cannot find this behaviour documented
> | anywhere on the web. So it looks like a bug in tex to me.
>
> Probably.

Is there someone who wants to earn money for finding a bug in TeX? I can 
report that in the TeXBook I have not found clearly stated that \input 
always appends the .tex extension although in all cases that are given 
as examples the .tex extension is missing and always something like 
\input story refers to story.tex.

That could perhaps be considered a bug in the TeXBook. I haven't checked 
the literate source of TeX, since \input is a TeX primitive.

But life is not so easy if you look into latex.ltx. The \input in LaTeX 
is redefined so that one can write

  \input{file}

instead of

  \input file

(in fact, one can do both).

Anyway, it all boils down to

\@@input axiom.sty

where \@@input is the original TeX primitive.

OK, let's make an experiment that doesn't involve LaTeX.

%%%BEGIN aaa.tex
\input aaa.sty
\bye
%%%END aaa.tex

%%%BEGIN aaa.sty
\message{======= I am aaa.sty =======}
%%%END aaa.sty

%%%BEGIN aaa.sty.tex
\message{======= I am aaa.sty.tex =======}
%%%END aaa.sty.tex

>tex aaa.tex
This is TeX, Version 3.14159 (Web2C 7.4.5)
(./aaa.tex (./aaa.sty.tex ======= I am aaa.sty.tex =======) )
No pages of output.
Transcript written on aaa.log.

You can replace "sty" by "bbb" if you like.

Since when you compile axiom.sty.tex also axiom.sty must be in the path 
\usepackage will always take axiom.sty.tex instead. So the option of 
moving the files to another place does not help since they must be 
visible at the same time.

Most of you opt now for renaming axiom.sty.pamphlet to something else 
(like axiom-sty.pamphlet). I rather like to see the general rule that 
the generation should go

noweave file.pamphlet > file.pamphlet.tex

no matter how many dots are in "file".

Up to now I have only heard about MS-DOS and old CD formats that 
restrict more flexible names. Both also have the 8+3 restriction so they 
are actually out anyway if we stick to .pamphlet.

> | Changing axiom.sty.pamphlet to axiom-sty.pamphlet and added a
> | chunk named <<asxiom.sty>>= still seems like the right thing to
> | do to avoid this "bug". I one sentence explanation in the pamphlet
> | file should be enough documentation for such a simple change that
> | is otherwise consistent with the rest of the Axiom source code.
>
> I'm not disagreeing with that.  I'm explaning, *why* from my
> perspective, that exception to the general rule is acceptable -- even
> when I don't find it perfect or don't like it.

Why would you accept even a single exception if you can have something 
without it?

Ralf