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Format using tex and texindex

Format the Texinfo file with the shell command tex followed by the name of the Texinfo file. For example:

tex foo.texi

TeX will produce a DVI file as well as several auxiliary files containing information for indices, cross references, etc. The DVI file (for DeVice Independent file) can be printed on virtually any printe (see the following sections).

The tex formatting command itself does not sort the indices; it writes an output file of unsorted index data. (The texi2dvi command automatically generates indices; see section Format using texi2dvi.) To generate a printed index after running the tex command, you first need a sorted index to work from. The texindex command sorts indices. (The source file `texindex.c' comes as part of the standard Texinfo distribution, among other places.)

The tex formatting command outputs unsorted index files under names that obey a standard convention: the name of your main input file with any `.tex' (or similar, see section `tex invocation' in Web2c) extension removed, followed by the two letter names of indices. For example, the raw index output files for the input file `foo.texinfo' would be `foo.cp', `foo.vr', `foo.fn', `foo.tp', `foo.pg' and `foo.ky'. Those are exactly the arguments to give to texindex.

Instead of specifying all the unsorted index file names explicitly, you can use `??' as shell wildcards and give the command in this form:

texindex foo.??

This command will run texindex on all the unsorted index files, including any that you have defined yourself using @defindex or @defcodeindex. (You may execute `texindex foo.??' even if there are similarly named files with two letter extensions that are not index files, such as `foo.el'. The texindex command reports but otherwise ignores such files.)

For each file specified, texindex generates a sorted index file whose name is made by appending `s' to the input file name. The @printindex command knows to look for a file of that name (see section Index Menus and Printing an Index). texindex does not alter the raw index output file.

After you have sorted the indices, you need to rerun the tex formatting command on the Texinfo file. This regenerates the DVI file, this time with up-to-date index entries.

Finally, you may need to run tex one more time, to get the page numbers in the cross-references correct.

To summarize, this is a four step process:

1. Run tex on your Texinfo file. This generates a DVI file (with undefined cross-references and no indices), and the raw index files (with two letter extensions).
2. Run texindex on the raw index files. This creates the corresponding sorted index files (with three letter extensions).
3. Run tex again on your Texinfo file. This regenerates the DVI file, this time with indices and defined cross-references, but with page numbers for the cross-references from last time, generally incorrect.
4. Run tex one last time. This time the correct page numbers are written for the cross-references.

Alternatively, it's a one-step process: run texi2dvi.

You need not run texindex each time after you run tex. If you do not, on the next run, the tex formatting command will use whatever sorted index files happen to exist from the previous use of texindex. This is usually ok while you are debugging.

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