Re: [ePiX-users] Compilation failing after install

[Andrew D. Hwang]

On Sun, 2 Dec 2007, Ben Tillman wrote:

> On 02/12/2007, Jay Belanger <address@hidden> wrote:
> > "Ben Tillman" <address@hidden> writes:
> > ...
> > > Here is the output of ls -la in case these file sizes look abnormal:
> > >
> > > $ ls -la sp*
> > > lrwxrwxrwx 1 Ben None       9 Dec  2 15:49 sphere.cc -> sphere.xp
> > > -rwxr-xr-x 1 Ben None 3911576 Dec  2 16:17 sphere.eepic
> > > -rw-r--r-- 1 Ben None    1228 Aug  2 05:43 sphere.xp
> > > -rw-r--r-- 1 Ben None   31961 Dec  2 16:16 sphere_eepic.log
> > > -rw-r--r-- 1 Ben None     195 Dec  2 10:58 sphere_xp.log
>
> Oops, I'm sorry. I was honestly thinking that the compiler output should
> have been the eepic file itself, so I -o sphere.eepic.
Hi Ben,

It's a reasonable assumption. :)

As you've gathered, ePiX uses g++ to parse input files. Specifically, an 
input file contains a C++ program which, when compiled and run, writes a 
LaTeX picture to standard output. The shell script "epix" manages details 
of the process, in particular directing stdout to an output file. (It's 
possible to write directly to a named file, see pp. 32-33 of the manual, 
but that's usually a more specialized need.)

In this sense, ePiX differs from gnuplot, Asymptote, GNU 3DLDF, et. al., 
which provide their own input language and interpreter. Once you've got 
the software working, the "user interface" should be indistinguishable 
from other text-based drawing/plotting programs. ("Write input file, 
process, include output into LaTeX document".)

> 2. Once I have the eepic file (I guess just the log.txt I have now), I 
> can't see where in the manual it shows how to insert this file into my 
> tex file without just pasting it in.
My oops...the manual used to contain explicit instructions, but they seem 
to have been removed during the "Version 1.2" rewrite. Will fix this in 
the near future.

Please post if you still have questions, or if/when you figure out why 
compiling an image initially didn't work for you.

Andy

Andrew D. Hwang                 address@hidden
Department of Math and CS       http://mathcs.holycross.edu/~ahwang
College of the Holy Cross       (508) 793-2458 (Office: 320 Swords)
Worcester, MA, 01610-2395       (508) 793-3530 (fax)