Constructing a Custom TeX Ecosystem for Educational Institutions—Beyond Academic Typesetting

This presentation was delivered at BachoTeX 2025 in Poland.

It introduces the design and implementation of a custom TeX ecosystem developed over 18 years at a Japanese educational institution.

By creating an in-house TeX distribution tightly integrated with macOS, we were able to leverage macOS capabilities to the fullest—enabling even non-technical staff to produce professional-quality documents with a single click.

The talk explores the technical details behind this integration and concludes with a discussion of challenges ahead.

Transcript

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   .F Yusuke TERADA from Tokyo, Japan A private preparatory school teacher for high-school students Japanese TeX Development Community A contributor to TeXShop development Major work: TeX2img https://tex2img.tech/
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   4DIPPMT Privately-run schools which provide education supplementary to public education Aim to help students prepare entrance exams
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   4VCKFDU Mathematics Physics Chemistry Biology Earth Science Information Science English Literature Classical Japanese Classical Chinese Geography History
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    4ZTUFN All staff use macOS devices: Company-provided Macs (full-time staff) BYOD Macs (part-time staff) BYOD = Bring Your Own Device Our in-house TeX distribution is installed on every machine "TTVNQUJPOT
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    %JTUSJCVUJPO Tailored specifically for in-house use on macOS Lightweight and compact Includes everything needed for our use Bundled with a customized version of TeXShop Not based on TeX Live Coexists safely with TeX Live Delivered and updated via our internal server
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    -JWF 1. Historical 2. Size 3. Update Control Prevents unintended incompatibility Our distribution (~1.5 GB) vs. TeX Live (> 9 GB) TeX Live wasn't as mature in 2007 as it is now
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    *OUFHSBUJPO macOS APFS (File System) Cocoa (API) dvipdfmx upmendex Compiler DVI driver Index processor In-house distro Custom Editor TeXShop Fonts Printing System Compile Script In-house Packages upLaTeX Tools Printed output
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    &NCFEEJOH macOS dvipdfmx HEIC image In-house distro In-house Packages upLaTeX sips (OS command) JPEG image graphics.sty
29. JODMVEFIFJDTUZ https://github.com/doraTeX/includeheic Available at GitHub:
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    6TFS'SJFOEMZ All major packages are preloaded tikz, tcolorbox, amsmath, multicol, ... Font invoking commands are defined for all macOS built-in fonts Compile Script handles: Compilation: LaTeX → DVI → PDF Automatically runs makeindex/upmendex when required Translates error messages into user-friendly explanations
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    5SBOTMBUJPO Before dvipdfmx:warning: Glyph for CID 22113 missing in font "HiraginoSerif.ttc" # After You attempted to typeset a glyph that is not available in the mapped font. It appears as a blank space in the output PDF. Change the font used for that character. Search for the following character and wrap it with \hanamin{} to use Hanazono Mincho font: * 䂬 ➡ \hanamin{䂬} '
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    0QUJNJ[BUJPO Key to acceleration: mylatexformat
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    0QUJNJ[BUJPO Too much time spent on expanding macros in packages mylatexformat .fmt File Macro expansion already done Use as Format File instead of Standard Format Files (latex.fmt, pdflatex.fmt, uplatex.fmt, ...)
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    3FHFOFSBUJPO In-house distro Compile Script macOS APFS (File System) .fmt File MD5 Checksum Checksum Extended Attributes Compare Generate and Embed Checksum (if updated)
40. 0VUDPNFT Accessible to All Staff: Minimal IT skills required From managers to part-timers Simple TeX Workflow: Seamless document production with beautiful results Single-click document creation Automation boosts operational efficiency across the organization TeX has been widely adopted across the entire company!
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    "IFBE Keeping Up with the Latest LaTeX TeX Live is evolving rapidly LaTeX kernel has changed a lot over the past decade Hard to follow recent updates Migrating to LuaTeX? upLaTeX is specialized for Japanese typesetting LuaTeX is becoming the new standard upLaTeX is often said to have no future
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    -VB5F9 Should we migrate to LuaTeX? → In principle yes, but not realistic for now Why not? 18 years of legacy Speed concerns Future hardware advances may eventually solve this
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    4VTUBJOBCJMJUZ Deep knowledge of TeX and macOS internals required to maintain our system Currently maintained by only one person Need for successor training
45. $PODMVTJPO TeX is not just a typesetting engine It can support: Educational material development Internal infrastructure Organizational workflows Key to success: Seamless integration User-friendly design