mailing-list for TeXmacs Users

["Andrey G. Grozin" <address@hidden>]

On Thu, 23 Jun 2011, El.Douwen wrote:
> MacOS/ containing "Maxima" ("executable unix file")
> Ressources/ containing an "Appsetting.plist", an icon, a "maxima.sh", a "script", a folder about languages (here only 
> english), a folder /maxima containing "bin", "lib", "libexec", and "share"
> i type in texmacs the path of "maxima.sh" by draging this file from the 
> finder to the terminal window. that is to say : 
> /Applications/Maxima.app/Contents/Resources/maxima.sh
> i seems that this operation launches maxima
> it is written this :
> ———
> Maxima 5.24.0 http://maxima.sourceforge.net
> using Lisp SBCL 1.0.42
> Distributed under the GNU Public License. See the file COPYING.
> Dedicated to the memory of William Schelter.
> The function bug_report() provides bug reporting information.
> (%i1)
> ———
> now two questions :
> - if i type 1+1 then press return (or shift return or page break or 
> others combinations) nothing occurs
Great! Now you have it working. Just type
1+1;
and then <return> (don't forget ; at the end of each maxima command).

So, it seems, the script which is called "maxima" in Linux has the name 
"maxima.sh" in MacOS.

> - where do i tell texmacs that the path for maxima is 
> /Applications/Maxima.app/Contents/Resources/maxima.sh

It would be easier to make a symlink to it called just "maxima" in some 
directory in your $PATH. After that, typing just
maxima
in a terminal window will start 
/Applications/Maxima.app/Contents/Resources/maxima.sh.
Of course, alternatively, you can edit a few files in your TeXmacs 
installation. In Linus, they are
/usr/share/TeXmacs/plugins/maxima/progs/init-maxima.scm
/usr/libexec/TeXmacs/bin/tm_maxima
/usr/libexec/TeXmacs/bin/maxima_detect
(don't know where MacOS folks have put them to).

> - more generally, what is the method to install a texmacs extension, 
> like the ones in the list you gave ?
They are not TeXmacs extensions! They are separate programs, some of them 
surely larger than TeXmacs, and all of them can be installed and used 
without TeXmacs. But TeXmacs can interact with them, if they are 
installed. And this is very useful, because you can easily cut-and-paste 
results from one computer algebra system to another one, etc., within 
TeXmacs.

Your choice of just 3 programs to which TeXmacs can interface seems a bit 
random. For example, reduce and axiom (and its forks fricas and openaxiom) 
are as powerful computer algebra systems as maxima; octave and scilab are 
powerful matlab-like programs for numerical linear algebra; GNU R is the 
leading program for statistical analyses; etc. All of them, and more, can 
be used from within TeXmacs.

Andrey