[OS X TeX] [pstricks] MacTEX install problems

[Peter Dyballa]

Am 03.08.2013 um 02:05 schrieb Don Green Dragon:

> In my template I have NEITHER of the lines
> 
> % !TEX TS-program = latex
> % !TEX encoding = UTF-8 Unicode
> 
> however I do have the two lines
> 
> \usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}
> \usepackage[T1]{fontenc}

The first two lines, those starting with the percent sign, are only meaningful for the TeXShop application. Every TeX related binary does not see them, because they are comments. For TeXShop they are setting "latex" as the command to compile the source file (which means DVI output, not PDF directly, only a bit of micro-typography, no support for TrueType fonts, instead a possibly better support of PSTricks) and the UTF-8 text encoding for its contents, which matches the LaTeX source's setting

> \usepackage[utf8]{inputenc}

> 
> The second line is included because it allows me to use the guillemets characters and certain other symbols, but I've never really understood why the first line is there. Note that the first line above is NOT what you recommend below, namely 
> 
> \usepackage[utf8x]{inputenc}

Both encodings are more or less equal. The "utf8" encoding is legacy, provided by the LaTeX team, the "utf8x" encoding is Heiko Oberdiek's work, just another package. Their documentation can be found here:

	/usr/local/texlive/2012/texmf-dist/doc/latex/base/inputenc.pdf
	/usr/local/texlive/2012/texmf-dist/doc/latex/oberdiek/inputenx.pdf

> 
> In  TextShop -> Preferences... -> Encoding
> 
> the default "Western(Mac OS Roman)" is still in effect. I'm leery of changing that to one of
> 
> 	Unicode (UTF-8)  or  Unicode (UTF-16)
> 
> but I conclude that you are recommending such a change! If I were to select one of the above, then I wonder what TeXShop does when opening an 'old' .tex file that was created using the "Western(Mac OS Roman)" option.

The LaTeX formats based on the pdfTeX or original TeX engines *do not* support a 16-bit encoding (pTeX, XeTeX, and LuaTeX support 16-bit input encodings). To help TeXShop understand the file's encoding – if it does not read in a basic 8-bit encoding the \usepackage[???]{inputenc} line – use the line "!TEX encoding" line Luis was recommending, but use the correct name TeXShop uses and which matches the chosen LaTeX input encoding!

--
Greetings

  Pete

The world would be a better place if Larry Wall had been born in Iceland, or any other country where the native language actually has syntax.
				– Peter da Silva