[comp.text.tex] removing the tex.pool file from TeX

acmfiu@serss0.fiu.edu (ACMFIU) (03/02/91)

can anyone see any possible problems with fixing TeX so that it does not
refer to the tex.pool file?

in order to do this, i'd just have to make TeX never call get_strings_started
and everywhere there is a quoted string in TEX.WEB i'd just have to replace
that with writeln()'s and then modify the screen output routines. i do not
see this as a difficulty and it would make it much easier to modify TeX,
rather than making a modification to the changefile and then rebuilding
TeX.

albert

dhosek@euler.claremont.edu (Don Hosek) (03/02/91)

In article <2703@kluge.fiu.edu>, acmfiu@serss0.fiu.edu (ACMFIU) writes:
> can anyone see any possible problems with fixing TeX so that it does not
> refer to the tex.pool file?
 
> in order to do this, i'd just have to make TeX never call get_strings_started
> and everywhere there is a quoted string in TEX.WEB i'd just have to replace
> that with writeln()'s and then modify the screen output routines. 

I don't think you really want to do this; the assumptions about
the string pool are embedded all over TeX. It would be a rather
major undertaking.

>i do not
> see this as a difficulty and it would make it much easier to modify TeX,
> rather than making a modification to the changefile and then rebuilding
> TeX.

Excuse me? Umm, are you indicating that you would rather work
with the Pascal "brick" or (worse yet) web2c output? Yeesh, this
has all the disadvantages of patching an executable and then
some. One of the big advantages of the change file mechanism is
that system-dependent changes are independent of the central
file. When TeX 3.14 comes out, I can update all my change files
in little more time than it takes to load them into the editor
and save them. If you're messing with post-TANGLE files, well,
good luck.

-dh

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