[OS X TeX] Yosemite install broke LaTeXiT (and Ghostscript)

[Richard Koch]

On Sep 17, 2014, at 3:40 PM, Ettore Aldrovandi <ealdrov at mail.math.fsu.edu> wrote:

> The strange thing is that /usr/local/bin/gs was pointing to gs-noX11 before, and to gs-X11 after, if I understand correctly.  Whatever the installer does, /usr/local is usually left alone.


If I understand this comment correctly, I don't think so. If you install Ghostscript
using MacTeX, then MacTeX installs both gs-X11 and gs-noX11. After that, in the postinstall
script, MacTeX tests to see if X11 is installed. If so, it defines a symbolic link
gs --> gs-X11. Otherwise it defines gs --> gs-noX11. 

The problem is that in recent operating systems, Apple automatically installed
X11, and therefore MacTeX installed a gs that requires X11. In most cases,
the user has never used X11 and doesn't know about this dependency. But when
an update to Yosemite removes X11, gs stops working. Actually, the user has
a working copy of gs, namely gs-noX11. The user just needs to reset the link
or else install X11.

Dick