RE: 'Fatal format file error; I'm stymied'

["Dave Korn" <dave dot korn at artimi dot com>]

On 02 April 2007 00:15, Angelo Graziosi wrote:

> I want to flag this problem with teTeX.

> ---! /var/lib/texmf/web2c/pdftex.fmt was written by pdfetex
> (Fatal format file error; I'm stymied)pdftex tex-ref.tex

> ---! /var/lib/texmf/web2c/pdftex.fmt was written by pdfetex
> (Fatal format file error; I'm stymied)

> ---! /var/lib/texmf/web2c/etex.fmt was written by pdfetex
> (Fatal format file error; I'm stymied)
> /usr/bin/texi2dvi: texinfo.tex appears to be broken, quitting.

> and similar.
> 
> I have searched the list and Google finding the solutions suggested in:
> http://sourceware.org/ml/cygwin/2006-07/msg00130.html
>
http://www.google.co.uk/search?q=%22tetex+3.0.0-3+format+file+problem%22&hl=en
> http://www.cygwin.com/ml/cygwin/2005-05/msg00963.html
> http://www.karakas-online.de/mySGML/fatal-format-file-error.html
> http://www.tex.ac.uk/cgi-bin/texfaq2html?label=formatstymy
> 
> but they do not solve it.
> 
> I have also tried uninstalling all teTeX packages, removing all 'texmf'
> directory that uninstall does not remove and then reinstalling the tetex
> packages, but the problem is still there.

  I had this problem just yesterday!  And I found a solution, at least for
etex.fmt.  These files are generated automatically by tetex if they don't yet
exist, it runs the command "mktexfmt etex.fmt" or whichever other *.fmt file
is required.  To see it happen, remove both the system-wide and the user-local
etex.fmt files:

rm /var/lib/texmf/web2c/etex.fmt
rm ~/.texmf/var/web2c/etex.fmt

then run

etex //end

  When I do that, I see output that starts like this:

/repository/gcc-build/gcc $ etex \\end
This is e-TeXk, Version 3.141592-2.2 (Web2C 7.5.4)
 file:line:error style messages enabled.
 %&-line parsing enabled.
kpathsea: Running mktexfmt etex.fmt
fmtutil: running `pdfetex -ini   -jobname=etex -progname=etex
-translate-file=cp
227.tcx *etex.ini' ...
This is pdfeTeXk, Version 3.141592-1.21a-2.2 (Web2C 7.5.4) (INITEX)
 file:line:error style messages enabled.
 %&-line parsing enabled.
 (/usr/share/texmf/web2c/cp227.tcx)

...and ends like this:

\font\preloaded=manfnt
14787 words of font info for 50 preloaded fonts
14 hyphenation exceptions
Hyphenation trie of length 6075 has 181 ops out of 35111
  181 for language 0
No pages of output.
Transcript written on etex.log.
fmtutil: /home/dk/.texmf/var/web2c/etex.fmt installed.
---! /home/dk/.texmf/var/web2c/etex.fmt was written by pdfetex
(Fatal format file error; I'm stymied)

  So, you can see for some reason the fmtutil script (mktexfmt is a soft link
-> fmtutil) is choosing the wrong engine to generate the etex.fmt file, and
etex is correct when it complains the file was written by the wrong engine.
To solve this, I would change into the user-local .texmf dir and remove the
busted one it just generated:

cd ~/.texmf/var/web2c
rm etex.fmt

then manually run a corrected version of the command that fmtutil output at
the start of its run above:

etex -ini   -jobname=etex -progname=etex -translate-file=cp227.tcx *etex.ini

and then I get a working etex.fmt, as shown by:

~/.texmf/var/web2c $ etex \\end
This is e-TeXk, Version 3.141592-2.2 (Web2C 7.5.4)
 file:line:error style messages enabled.
 %&-line parsing enabled.
entering extended mode
No pages of output.
Transcript written on texput.log.
~/.texmf/var/web2c $ 

  I don't know why fmtutil chooses the wrong engine, but I believe that is the
entire underlying bug.


    cheers,
      DaveK
-- 
Can't think of a witty .sigline today....


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