Welcome to the UK List of
TeX Frequently Asked Questions
on the Web
Installing packages, as they (“traditionally”) appear on
CTAN, involves:
- identifying where to put the various files on an TDS
tree,
- installing them, and
- a few housekeeping operations.
Most people, for most packages, find the first two steps onerous, the
last being easy (unless it is forgotten!).
Ready-built ZIP files — also known as
TDS-ZIP files — are designed to lighten
the load of performing the first two steps of installation: they
contain all the files that are that’s to be installed for a given
package, in their “correct” locations in a
TDS tree.
To install such a file on a Unix system (we assume that you’ll install
into the local TEXMF tree, at $TEXMFLOCAL):
cd $TEXMFLOCAL
unzip $package.tds.zip
On a Windows system that is modern enough that it has a built-in
ZIP unpacker, simply double-click on the file, and browse to
where it’s to be unpacked. (We trust that those using earlier
versions of Windows will already have experience of using
WinZIP or the like.)
Having unpacked the .zip archive, in most cases the only
remaining chore is to update the file indexes — as in
normal installation instructions. However, if
the package provides a font, you also need to enable the font’s map,
which is discussed in
“Installing a Type 1 font”
Go to
previous question, or
next question
Go to FAQ home.
URL for this question: http://www.tex.ac.uk/cgi-bin/texfaq2html?label=inst-tds-zip
Comments, suggestions, or error reports? - see
“how to improve the FAQ”.
This is FAQ version 3.20, last modified on 2010-08-17.