Document Classes ⇒ Where do I put an input file?

[ajnabi]

I am trying to install the invoice package which requires, among other things, the realcalc package. I can't figure out how to install it.

Here are the installation instructions:

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Installation:
     Put the file realcalc.tex where your TeX looks for inputs.
     Name a copy realcalc.sty to use as a LaTeX style option,
     or create a file realcalc.sty with the lines:
          \input realcalc.tex
          \endinput

Does anyone know where I should put this realcalc.tex file?

I tried putting it in /usr/share/texmf/tex/inputs/ to no avail.

I am not sure how to make a sty file. That seems ideal. Copying realcalc.tex to realcalc.sty and isntalling that didn't work. I've tried running latex on a file with just these two lines in it:

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  \input realcalc.tex
  \endinput

Any help appreciated.

Thanks,
Frank

[gmedina]

The answer depends on your particular distribution. In my texlive I do the following for a pac_name.sty file:
1) create a directory pac_name on /usr/share/texmf-texlive/tex/latex/
2) copy the file pac_name.sty into this new directory
3) in a terminal, run

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texconfig rehash

However, this page and the links in it can give you some additional hints.

Edit: (from CTAN page, referring to realcalc):

There are known problems with this package; an alternative is fp (a latex package, only).

[ajnabi]

Thanks gmedina,

an alternative is fp

The problem is that I'm installing realcalc because it's a dependency for this invoice package.

After hearing your point that realcalc has issues, I'm thinking a simpler solution would be to make a PHP script do all the calculations and then layout a LaTeX file which would then generate a PDF invoice. It would also be more customized to my needs.

Thanks for your help.

Frank

[ajnabi]

I don't know if this would be helpful to anyone but I made a quick sty install script (for *nix). Anyone who uses it would have to change the texdir variable to the correct path for your distribution.

Usage (assuming saved as styinstall):
styinstall package.sty

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#!/bin/sh
file=`echo $1 | sed -e 's#\.sty$##'`
texdir="/usr/share/texmf/tex/latex/"
sudo mkdir $texdir$file
sudo cp $1 $texdir$file/
ls $texdir$file/*
sudo texhash
exit 0

[jjt3]

The realcalc.tex package should go into

. . . texmf-dist\tex\generic\realcalc

or

. . . texmf\tex\generic\realcalc

where the dots stand for whatever path leads to one of these folders (the first is preferable).

Then you must refresh the ls-R database (in TeXnicCenter) or similar in MikTeX; this is an important step whenever you add a new file, be it .tex, .cls or .sty, to your TeX distribution. (You need to close your TeX IDE down whilst you do this, so the new database will be loaded.)

John

[ajnabi]

Thanks jjt3,

I abandoned the install because I couldn't get it to work.

When I get some time I will try this.

Thanks,
Frank

[balfonsi]

Did you refresh the filename database? Otherwise tex won't find it!

B.A.