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The Problem is that TeXLive still defaults to doing a full install. A full install means installing ~4000 packages, including their source files (tens of thous

by maxnoe 4y ago

The Problem is that TeXLive still defaults to doing a full install. A full install means installing ~4000 packages, including their source files (tens of thousands of tex files) and built documentation (thousands of PDF files) and hundreds of free fonts (otfs, ttfs, texs own format). This is huge (>7GB, not just the 5 GB claimed here). However, you don't need 99 % of this for any given document. Not installing the source files and documentation PDFs will alone reduce the size by roughly half. Only installing the packages you really need from a minimal installation gives you a few hundred megabytes at most for even complex documents. It's a bit annoying to get the list of packages needed though, since there is not really any working dependency management. I wrote a python wrapper around the tex live installer [1] to make this easy for CI jobs, see e.g. [2]. On a side note: I'd recommend luatex over xetex. - [1] https://github.com/maxnoe/texlive-batch-installation/ https://github.com/maxnoe/texlive-batch-installation/ - [2] https://github.com/pep-dortmund/toolbox-workshop/blob/8b00f030ae4c15294df9f9f9357c6078a70e520b/.github/workflows/ci.yml#L25 https://github.com/pep-dortmund/toolbox-workshop/blob/8b00f0...

woile 4y ago
I can't believe I read this comment literally 10 minutes after installing endless GBs of xetex haha. Thanks for the info!
jcelerier 4y ago
On archlinux there's the texlive-core package which does not ship the PDF docs (most of the size). It should install 500mb (most of which are fonts..) and already provide enough to build normal documents, including lualatex for unicode support
JadeNB 4y ago
TeXLive also comes with installation schemes that will give you (if I remember the names correctly) bare, medium, and full installations, if you prefer not to pick packages yourself. Alternately, although I don't use it myself, I'm sure you could use MikTeX, which is much better about on-demand package installation. (Or even Overleaf, if you don't want to put anything on your local device!)
phire 4y ago
> It's a bit annoying to get the list of packages needed though, since there is not really any working dependency management. Sounds like someone should just create a wrapper that catches file opens of uninstalled dependencies and automatically downloads them on the fly.
- sanxiyn 4y ago
  This has been done and yes people should switch to this. "Tectonic automatically downloads support files so you don't have to install a full LaTeX system in order to start using it. If you start using a new LaTeX package, Tectonic just pulls down the files it needs and continues processing." https://tectonic-typesetting.github.io/ https://tectonic-typesetting.github.io/
  - bradrn 4y ago
    MikTeX also does this: https://docs.miktex.org/manual/autoinstall.html https://docs.miktex.org/manual/autoinstall.html. As far as I’m aware, TeX Live is unique in forcing the user to install all packages at once. [EDIT: And in fact, if a cousin comment is to be believed, TeX Live also allows this kind of installation! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32535521 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32535521]
    - svat 4y ago
      TeX Live allows a minimal installation, but what MikTeX has that TeX Live doesn't (AFAIK) is the on-demand automatic fetching and installing of packages. For example, if you `\usepackage{foo}` then with a minimal TeX Live you have to install it manually (with `tlmgr install foopkg`), while MiKTeX will either install it automatically or pop up a prompt asking you whether you want to install foopkg.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
dhosek 4y ago
I did some digging about a year ago and the biggest uses of space are the docs and, surprisingly, fonts: https://www.reddit.com/r/LaTeX/comments/oqmb3w/installed_mactex_but_why_is_it_almost_5gb_in_size/h6dt4us/?context=3 https://www.reddit.com/r/LaTeX/comments/oqmb3w/installed_mac... It’s mostly a death by a thousand cuts thing. MikTeX, which is available for Mac and Linux as well as Windows will do on-demand downloading of packages and is probably my recommendation for a new installation. A lot of the drawbacks to TeX stem from to trying to meet the combined requirements of computing platforms of the 1970s–1990s. All input files effectively live in a single namespace so you cannot have two input files with the same name (the same applies to coding where you have a single namespace for all your commands as well).
ddmitriev 4y ago
Eons (>15 years) ago, I sold software that relied on having a working TeX installation, and to make it easier on my users, my installer provided a very very trimmed down version of MiKTeX as an optional download. The beautiful thing about MiKTeX is that its autoinstall feature meant that one could delete 90% of the packages, and the worst that would happen is that referencing something I deemed unessential would prompt a just-in-time download. I recall I managed to cut MiKTeX down to about 12MB. Never heard a single complaint about it.
- m_mueller 4y ago
  Why hasn’t something like this become the standard way to use LaTeX? Boggles my mind.
  - bzxcvbn 4y ago
    Latex is stuck in the past. Academic publishers even more so. It's 2022, and I can't use slightly non-standard letters (e.g. non-Latin characters) in my papers without jumping through hoops. It's anyone's guess as to which ones will work and which won't. The language was designed in the 80's and it shows, many commonly used packages are severely outdated and nobody cares.
    - m_mueller 4y ago
      I guess noone can receive fake brownie points (paper impact factor) by fixing that stuff.
jhoechtl 4y ago
Development and re-juvenile of groff is recently taking a good path. While groff is still single-pass and doesn't do paragraph-at-once type setting, it is a much more pleasant experience than maybe like five years ago.

by maxnoe 4y ago

woile 4y ago

I can't believe I read this comment literally 10 minutes after installing endless GBs of xetex haha. Thanks for the info!

jcelerier 4y ago

On archlinux there's the texlive-core package which does not ship the PDF docs (most of the size). It should install 500mb (most of which are fonts..) and already provide enough to build normal documents, including lualatex for unicode support

JadeNB 4y ago

TeXLive also comes with installation schemes that will give you (if I remember the names correctly) bare, medium, and full installations, if you prefer not to pick packages yourself. Alternately, although I don't use it myself, I'm sure you could use MikTeX, which is much better about on-demand package installation. (Or even Overleaf, if you don't want to put anything on your local device!)

phire 4y ago

> It's a bit annoying to get the list of packages needed though, since there is not really any working dependency management. Sounds like someone should just create a wrapper that catches file opens of uninstalled dependencies and automatically downloads them on the fly.

sanxiyn 4y ago
This has been done and yes people should switch to this. "Tectonic automatically downloads support files so you don't have to install a full LaTeX system in order to start using it. If you start using a new LaTeX package, Tectonic just pulls down the files it needs and continues processing." https://tectonic-typesetting.github.io/ https://tectonic-typesetting.github.io/
- bradrn 4y ago
  MikTeX also does this: https://docs.miktex.org/manual/autoinstall.html https://docs.miktex.org/manual/autoinstall.html. As far as I’m aware, TeX Live is unique in forcing the user to install all packages at once. [EDIT: And in fact, if a cousin comment is to be believed, TeX Live also allows this kind of installation! https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32535521 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=32535521]
  - svat 4y ago
    TeX Live allows a minimal installation, but what MikTeX has that TeX Live doesn't (AFAIK) is the on-demand automatic fetching and installing of packages. For example, if you `\usepackage{foo}` then with a minimal TeX Live you have to install it manually (with `tlmgr install foopkg`), while MiKTeX will either install it automatically or pop up a prompt asking you whether you want to install foopkg.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

dhosek 4y ago

I did some digging about a year ago and the biggest uses of space are the docs and, surprisingly, fonts: https://www.reddit.com/r/LaTeX/comments/oqmb3w/installed_mactex_but_why_is_it_almost_5gb_in_size/h6dt4us/?context=3 https://www.reddit.com/r/LaTeX/comments/oqmb3w/installed_mac... It’s mostly a death by a thousand cuts thing. MikTeX, which is available for Mac and Linux as well as Windows will do on-demand downloading of packages and is probably my recommendation for a new installation. A lot of the drawbacks to TeX stem from to trying to meet the combined requirements of computing platforms of the 1970s–1990s. All input files effectively live in a single namespace so you cannot have two input files with the same name (the same applies to coding where you have a single namespace for all your commands as well).

ddmitriev 4y ago

Eons (>15 years) ago, I sold software that relied on having a working TeX installation, and to make it easier on my users, my installer provided a very very trimmed down version of MiKTeX as an optional download. The beautiful thing about MiKTeX is that its autoinstall feature meant that one could delete 90% of the packages, and the worst that would happen is that referencing something I deemed unessential would prompt a just-in-time download. I recall I managed to cut MiKTeX down to about 12MB. Never heard a single complaint about it.

m_mueller 4y ago
Why hasn’t something like this become the standard way to use LaTeX? Boggles my mind.
- bzxcvbn 4y ago
  Latex is stuck in the past. Academic publishers even more so. It's 2022, and I can't use slightly non-standard letters (e.g. non-Latin characters) in my papers without jumping through hoops. It's anyone's guess as to which ones will work and which won't. The language was designed in the 80's and it shows, many commonly used packages are severely outdated and nobody cares.
  - m_mueller 4y ago
    I guess noone can receive fake brownie points (paper impact factor) by fixing that stuff.

jhoechtl 4y ago

Development and re-juvenile of groff is recently taking a good path. While groff is still single-pass and doesn't do paragraph-at-once type setting, it is a much more pleasant experience than maybe like five years ago.