Unhelpful metapost error

[Wookey]

+++ Olly Betts [04-10-14 04:27 +0100]:

>> On Fri, Oct 01, 2004 at 09:20:11AM +0200, Stacho Mudrak wrote:
>
>>>> > >therion: error -- metapost exit code -- 256
>>
>>> >
>>> > This is strange, usually metapost writes something to log file. Do you
>>> > remember your wrong data arrangement?
>>> >
>>> > If you would like to see (in the future), where the problem is, you can
>>> > run therion with -d option. Than all temporary files will not be deleted
>>> > and in the {$TEMP}/thTMPDIR you will find therion metapost file data.mp.
>
>>
>> OK, this problem hasn't gone away (we've just been using the box it
>> works on).  But looking at it again, if I run therion -d the output from
>> metapost is:
>>
>>     This is MetaPost, Version 0.641 (Web2C 7.4.5)
>>     kpathsea: Running mktexfmt mpost.mem
>>     fmtutil: format `mpost' not available.
>>     I can't find the mem file `mpost.mem'!
>>     therion: error -- metapost exit code -- 256
>>
>> It turns out that the problem box is missing /var/lib/texmf/web2c/mpost.mem
>> while the other box has it.  Both boxes are running debian "unstable",
>> but that file isn't owned by any package (so I presume it is generated
>> by installing one of the tetex packages or something list that).
>>
>> Digging deeper, the "good" box has tetex-extra installed, but the "bad"
>> box doesn't, and after installing this package, everything works.  But
>> the debian therion package depends on tetex-bin but not tetex-extra so
>> it's not automatically installed.
>>
>> Wookey: I've not filed a Debian bug for this - let me know if you want
>> me to...


Nope - I'll fix that - I need to do an update anyway to have Debian therion
include the model viewer....

That's another 10MB on the therion footprint, which is a problem for
'embedded' use, but otherwise simple enough.

Well spotted.

Wookey
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