Hi Jim, If you provide (a link to) the source (privately, if you want) I can force Hans into a chat session, to see if we also get the problem.
/Mikael On Wed, 2 Sept 2026 at 17:10, Jim Diamond via ntg-context <[email protected]> wrote: > > Hraban and Max, thanks for replying. > > Max, Hraban, and others who may be interested... > > (More possibly-relevant details of the issue are found at the bottom of > this message.) > > On Wed, Sep 2, 2026 at 03:07 (-0600), Max Chernoff wrote: > > > Hi Jim, > > > On Tue, 2026-09-01 at 22:55 -0300, Jim Diamond via ntg-context wrote: > >> Compiling with today's stand-alone LMTX caused a bad page break, causing me > >> a bit of annoyance. Trying to track this issue down, I compiled my > >> document with TL's context. TL's context gave me a pdf which diffpdf says > >> is identical to the one from June (evidently diffpdf doesn't peer at the > >> internal organs of image files, but that is another issue). > > > Possible differences between TL and the Standalone Distribution: > > > 1. The default paper size in the Standalone Distribution is always A4; > > in TL, it depends on a system-wide setting configured with "tlmgr > > paper <size>". If you've changed TL's paper size to Letter, then > > you'll get completely different page layout than ConTeXt's default. > > The solution here is to always explicitly set the paper size in your > > documents. > > I explicitly set the paper size in this document, so that isn't ("shouldn't > be") the issue. > > > (I don't like this "feature" in TL either, and I argued against > > applying it to ConTeXt, but it was decided that having all the > > programs in TL be constant with each other is more important than > > having ConTeXt be consistent between different distributions.) > > > > 2. The fonts in TL are packaged independently of the fonts in the > > Standalone Distribution, so there could be differences there. If the > > metrics of the LM or TeX Gyre fonts changed in TL, we would have > > received dozens of complaints by now, so I'm pretty sure that they > > didn't change there, but maybe something changed in the Standalone > > Distribution's fonts? > > Maybe that has something to do with it. Indeed, diffpdf (using its > "appearance" comparison) does show differences for some of the text which > looks identical to my visual observation. In my experience that can happen > from very small spacing differences, as well as the appearance of the > glyphs themselves. So maybe there is something there. > > > 3. Perhaps this is all caused by some weird caching error? If that's the > > case, try deleting all the cache files, then run "mtxrun --generate" > > followed by "context --make". > > > I tried that on the standalone version (no change). Given the TL version > is working the same as the standalone version did in June, I am loathe to > mess with that. I guess I could back up the TL version and do that, but > since it "works" for me (i.e., it gives me the expected output) I'd try > that as some last resort. > > (More details below on what is happening, which indicate the standalone now > doing something unexpected/unintuitive.) > > > 4. The search paths are slightly different between TL and the Standalone > > Distribution, so maybe you have something weird in $TEXMFHOME (or > > similar) that's only being picked up by one of the distributions? > > I doubt it. All the text, images, ..., are the same, just some text > appears where it shouldn't (shouldn't as per my expectations and desires). > > > > 5. I could have screwed something up when repackaging ConTeXt for TL. > > Given how my scripts work, this would actually be pretty hard for me > > to do, but I'm also pretty good at breaking things in new and > > creative ways :). Typically this would lead to a total failure due to > > mismatched files rather than subtly different output though. > > I really doubt this is a problem, since, as I mention above in the message, > the TL version behaves the same as standalone did in June. > > > > 6. You've gotten unlucky enough to find a non-deterministic/chaotic page > > break, so you've just been measuring random noise rather than finding > > a "real" difference between the distributions. > > Non-deterministic typesetting is a bit disturbing to me. > > > > 7. You're loading some module in your document that's only available in > > TL (or the Standalone Distribution), but that affects the output when > > it's loaded. ConTeXt keeps going and only prints a single-line > > warning if you try to include a non-existent module, so it would be > > fairly easy to accidentally miss this. > > I am not using any modules. > > > > 8. TL excludes a few non-free files from ConTeXt, but these should only > > affect using system fonts on Windows/macOS (but you're on Linux) or > > using the koeieletters font (which I suspect you're not). > > I am not using that font. pdffonts says > XJWESD+LMRoman10-Regular > URAGMB+LMRoman10-Bold > GUNWMV+LMSans10-Regular > XTYCLB+LMRomanSlant10-Regular > LYADNC+LatinModernMath-Regular > OTPCUF+LMRoman10-Italic > PHHTUV+LMRomanCaps10-Regular > OXNTIK+LMMonoLt10-Bold > PHVKRL+LMMonoSlant10-Regular > EREARS+LMMono10-Regular > (although the 6 initial letters differ between the PDF from standalone and > the PDF from TL). > > > And all of these files are available in TLContrib, which I believe that > > you have installed already. > > > (1/4/6 seem like the most likely options to me) > > > Here is a portion of the code where the problem occurs: > > I output 20 figures using \placefigure like this: > > \placefigure[height,low,0*hang]{blah blah blah} > {\externalfigure[figureN][frame=on,height=0.45\textheight]} > > The "blah blah blah" changes from one figure to the next, as does the > height= specification. > > These are followed by > > \flushsidefloats > > \blank[medium] > {\bfa Yada yada yada:} > \startitemize[packed][distance=7.5em, leftmargindistance=2em,] > \sym {\bf Alice} blah blah blah. > \sym {\bf Bob} blah blah blah. > \stopitemize > > > With TL, the "Yada yada yada" comes out after all the figures, as I want. > With the current standalone, it comes out after the third (!) figure (but > the items come out after the last figure). > > > While playing with this, I found a solution or work-around: > If I use > \blank[medium,force] > instead of just > \blank[medium] > the "Yada yada yada" comes out after the figures, as desired. > > But this still makes me wonder why > (1) standalone needs that an TL doesn't, and > (2) why does standaline behave differently than it did in June? > > Although I have a work-around/fix, I'd still light to be enlightened on > those two questions. Can both of these be related to changed font metrics > of the LM fonts? > > Thanks. > Jim > > ___________________________________________________________________________________ > If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to the > Wiki! > > maillist : [email protected] / > https://mailman.ntg.nl/mailman3/lists/ntg-context.ntg.nl > webpage : https://www.pragma-ade.nl / https://context.aanhet.net (mirror) > archive : https://github.com/contextgarden/context > wiki : https://wiki.contextgarden.net > ___________________________________________________________________________________ ___________________________________________________________________________________ If your question is of interest to others as well, please add an entry to the Wiki! maillist : [email protected] / https://mailman.ntg.nl/mailman3/lists/ntg-context.ntg.nl webpage : https://www.pragma-ade.nl / https://context.aanhet.net (mirror) archive : https://github.com/contextgarden/context wiki : https://wiki.contextgarden.net ___________________________________________________________________________________
