Compiling TeX on the DECstation

[acar at ee.umr.edu]

In article <6188 at jhunix.HCF.JHU.EDU> barrett at jhunix.HCF.JHU.EDU
(Dan Barrett) writes:
|>
|>	In a previous comp.text.tex article entitled "Where did my math
|>symbols go??", I complained of the mysterious behavior of TeX on our
|>DECsystem 5400 running Ultrix 4.0.  THE PROBLEM IS SOLVED.  If you plan
|>on installing TeX on a similar system, please read this!
|>
|>	If you are compiling UNIX TeX 2.95 (or perhaps other version) on a
|>DECstation or DECsystem running Ultrix 4.0, using "cc"...
|>
|>			DO NOT USE THE OPTIMIZER!!!   (-O)
|>

I installed TeX82 V2.09 about a year ago on a DECstation without changing
the default optimization, and it is still working perfectly (well, the
metafont is not using X11). Your problem should be either with the
Ultrix V4.0 (mine is still V3.1), or with the new version of TeX82.

|>NUMEROUS mysterious problems were caused by use of the optimizer.  I cannot
|>say whether the optimizer or TeX is at fault, but I do know that TeX runs
|>just fine on the DECstation without optimization.

There is definitely something wrong with the optimizer, because with the
optimizer on, one of the files in the perl software (another wonderful
contribution of Larry Wall) is erroneously compiled. I know this, because
when I compiled that file separately, everything was A-OK.

|>Some problems were:
|>
|>	o	Math font information did not get included in the DVI file.
|>		Therefore, no math symbols showed up.
|>	o	LaTeX tabular environments do not generate anything in the
|>		DVI file -- tables are totally missing.
|>	o	LaTeX complains that it is out of space, and that you need
|>		to make "Big TeX", even when the document is not that large
|>		or complex.
|>	o	LaTeX complains about certain constructs that should work,
|>		like using a footnote inside a \chapter heading.
|>
|>All of these problems stopped happening when I compiled without optimization.
|>They were DEFINITELY introduced by the optimized virtex program itself, and
|>not the input files, tfm files, or pk files.  (Proof:  the DVI files were
|>actually missing references to fonts like "cmsy10" that should have been
|>there, and I used the exact set of input and tfm files that worked perfectly
|>on another machine.  More proof on request.)

I never had any of these problems.

|>	Hey DEC!!  Why did you set "make" to turn on optimization by
|>default???  BAD IDEA!

I don't think, DEC did this. I think optimization is selected in the
makefile which you have used to run the make. In my version, it is set
at the beginning by OPT = -O.

Well, at least you have installed it. Did you also install metafont
or is its X11 version still not available?

--
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L. Acar
Univ. of Missouri-Rolla
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