A TeX license violation: src_specials

[Petr Olsak]

On Fri, 31 May 2002, Petr Olsak wrote:

Pro vasi informaci. Vlny na jinak velmi tiche az skoro spici skupine
tex-implementors se zcerily (asi 20 mailu za tento den) a vypada to, ze
dojde ke zdrzeni vydani TeXlive. Priznavam, ze s takovymi dusledky jsem
nepocital :-(.

TeX se zapnutymi src_specials se bude predstavovat: This is
src-special-TeX, takze Matejova manzelka se uz nebude divit, ze na
Widowsech dostava jine vysledky nez v Linuxu. Proste na windowsech uvidi
src-special-TeX a bude hned vedet, ze to neni TeX.

Jak to nakonec dopadne, budu referovat pozdeji.

Petr Olsak

-----------------------------------

>From olsak at math.feld.cvut.cz Fri May 31 18:04:13 2002
Date: Fri, 31 May 2002 10:41:52 +0200 (CEST)
From: Petr Olsak <olsak at math.feld.cvut.cz>
To: tex-implementors at ams.org
Cc: Vybor CSTUGu <cstugb-l at muni.cz>
Subject: A TeX license violation: src_specials


Hello,

I have found that the new TeX binaries (derived from web2c, for example
in TeXlive or MikTeX distributions) have the src_specials feature. This
feature is switched off in TeXlive by default, but if it is switched on in
texmf.cnf configuration file or by --src in command line, the binary still
say:

This is TeX version 3.14...

The binary lies!

I dont know what banner is used by MikTeX (I am not a Windows user),
but another users report that there is a command line option
--src used BY DEFAULT in TeX command line if Winedt editor is used.
The user is not informed, that he is not using the TeX!

I am sure that the tex binary with src_specials set on is not the TeX
because it does not conform the TRIP test. The different behavior of
tex output can be controlled only from macro level. You can try:

----------------
\let\special=\relax
First paragraph

Second praragraph
\end
-----------------

if you use "tex --src document", you get the corrupted output.
May be, it is a little bit synthetic example, but
there is a second example from a real life:

-------------------
\def\a#1{some do with #1 parameter}
\everypar{\a}
First paragraph
\end
-------------------

if you use "tex --src document", the \special token is scanned by macro
\a in #1 parameter! This is not the behavior of TeX.

Please, send this message to Donald Knuth. I am sure that src_special
option in new TeX binaries extremelly breaks his license for
TeX program. I think that only Knuth's opinion is significant in this
case.

The main problem is that the user is not informed that he is not used
the TeX program. He decides that the TeX has a differnet behavior on
(for example) Windows and on Unix. In the right case, he is used TeX
with --src option in Windows but he don't known about it, because command
options are usually hidden from user working environment.

Petr Olsak
CSTUG, Czech Republics.