garym@cognos.uucp@uunet.uu.net (Gary Murphy) (04/16/91)
Well ... some wizards are not so wizzy! A lot of the responses to my posting re:MF memory limits rudely commanded I scrap my MF and go BIG MF, some making nebulous references to non-existant passages in the holy books. Most responses were at least civil, but all those who advocated MORE MORE BIG BIG BIG have a bit too much of the Consumerist mind-set. Ok, so it was a big part my fault, but what's an order of magnitude between friends. It wasn't 5000 pages, but 500. The only _true_ wizard out there (apparently) at least saw this and, when I'd sent the LOG, (yes -- I should have posted it; bad Gary!) offered the following most excellent (and non-aquisitionist) reply which I post now for the benefit of those others who wrote complaining of similar troubles: >From: cunews!mitel!IRO.UMontreal.CA!jalbert (Francois Jalbert) >Date: Tue, 9 Apr 1991 22:47:39 EDT >To: cognos!garym (Gary Murphy) >Subject: Re: Waiting for the (emTeX MF) Electrician, or someone just like one >Hi Gary, -> ! METAFONT capacity exceeded, sorry [buffer size=500]. -> l.129 -> ^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@^^@... >This is typical of METAFONT (and TeX) encountering a very long line. >Input lines must be no more than 500 characters long. It is rare to >come across your error message as typical lines are only 80 characters long. > >I am somewhat worried about that chain of ^^@'s, but I'd guess that you >are trying to process a UNIX text file on a DOS computer. Remember that >UNIX end of lines are made of LF (Line Feed) characters only, while DOS >end of lines are made of CR (Carriage Return) *and* LF. If you transfer >a UNIX text file in binary mode (either directly or indirectly if compressed) >you will confuse METAFONT with it. > >If that's the problem, simply load the METAFONT input file into your >favorite DOS text editor and then save it back. Most editors will >automatically fix the end of lines for you. PC-Write does that through >Alt-F5 and F6 and F9 if I remember correctly. > >Keep hacking! Franky Thanks a million, Franky, this was just the ticket. For those still with me, my saga is not yet over: I can now generate those CMOE... fonts from ymir, but to my surprise, when I ran the TESTFONT.TEX I found the tables _only_ contain the thorn, eth and ogonek. How do I get a full Old-English font? Pointers (valid ones :-) appreciated! -- o| Gary Murphy |o |------------------------------------------------------------------------| o| uunet!mitel!cunews!cognos!garym garym%cognos.uucp@ccs.carlton.ca |o | Cognos Inc. P.O. Box 9707 Ottawa K1G 3N3 (613) 738-1338 x5537 | o| "There are many things which do not concern the process" - Joan of Arc |o