Common options

All of these programs accept the standard GNU `--help' and `--version' options, and several programs accept `--verbose'. Rather than writing identical descriptions in every node, they are described here.

`--help'

Print a usage message listing basic usage and all available options to standard output, then exit successfully.

`--verbose'

Print progress reports to standard output.

`--version'

Print the version number to standard output, then exit successfully.

TeX, Metafont, and MetaPost have additional options in common:

`-kpathsea-debug=number'

Set path searching debugging flags according to the bits of number (see section `Debugging' in Kpathsea). You can also specify this in KPATHSEA_DEBUG environment variable (for all Web2c programs). (The command line value overrides.) The most useful value is `-1', to get all available output.

`-ini'

Enable the "initial" form of the program (see section Initial and virgin). This is implicitly set if the program name is initex resp. inimf resp. inimpost.

`-fmt=dumpname'

`-base=dumpname'

`-mem=dumpname'

Use dumpname instead of the program name or a `%&' line to determine the name of the memory dump file read (`fmt' for TeX, `base' for Metafont, `mem' for MetaPost). See section Memory dumps. Also set the program name to dumpname.

`-progname=string'

Set program (and memory dump) name to string. This may affect the search paths and other values used (see section `Config files' in Kpathsea). Using this option is equivalent to making a link named string to the binary and then invoking the binary under that name. See section Memory dumps.

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