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! TeX capacity exceeded, sorry

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Phillip Helbig (undress to reply)

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Sep 13, 2021, 6:31:36 AM9/13/21
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How often is this a fatal error, i.e. the document is OK and there
really isn't enough capacity, and how often is it the result of an error
in the document?

Dr Eberhard Lisse

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Sep 13, 2021, 9:07:41 AM9/13/21
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I have not encountered that on Linux/Mac (ie more than 25 years) unless there
was a LaTeX syntax issue.

el
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To email me replace 'nospam' with 'el'

Robert Heller

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Sep 13, 2021, 10:32:06 AM9/13/21
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At Mon, 13 Sep 2021 15:07:34 +0200 Dr Eberhard Lisse <nos...@lisse.NA> wrote:

>
> I have not encountered that on Linux/Mac (ie more than 25 years) unless there
> was a LaTeX syntax issue.

I only encountered this way back olden days, generally gnormous documents on
machines with "tiny" amounts of memory with LaTeX systems built with small
limits to conserve memory. Or else with documents that had things like
runaway recursion problems, etc. I believe current versions of LaTeX builds
are fairly generous with the various fixed allocated elements. These fixed
allocated elements are controlled in config files and relate to how the format
files were built -- it is possible to custom build the format files with
larger capacity, if you really need to.

>
> el
>
> On 13/09/2021 12:31, Phillip Helbig (undress to reply) wrote:
> > How often is this a fatal error, i.e. the document is OK and there
> > really isn't enough capacity, and how often is it the result of an error
> > in the document?
> >
>
>

--
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Phillip Helbig (undress to reply)

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Sep 13, 2021, 1:26:02 PM9/13/21
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In article <kOOdnUqtL5hA_aL8...@giganews.com>, Robert
Heller <hel...@deepsoft.com> writes:

> At Mon, 13 Sep 2021 15:07:34 +0200 Dr Eberhard Lisse <nos...@lisse.NA> wrote:
>
> >
> > I have not encountered that on Linux/Mac (ie more than 25 years) unless there
> > was a LaTeX syntax issue.
>
> I only encountered this way back olden days, generally gnormous documents on
> machines with "tiny" amounts of memory with LaTeX systems built with small
> limits to conserve memory. Or else with documents that had things like
> runaway recursion problems, etc. I believe current versions of LaTeX builds
> are fairly generous with the various fixed allocated elements. These fixed
> allocated elements are controlled in config files and relate to how the format
> files were built -- it is possible to custom build the format files with
> larger capacity, if you really need to.

It turned out to be a syntax issue. Interestingly, the document both
compiled and produced the desired output up until the error. Probably
runaway recursion. I managed to fix it.

Peter Flynn

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Sep 13, 2021, 5:16:45 PM9/13/21
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On 13/09/2021 11:31, Phillip Helbig (undress to reply) wrote:
> How often is this a fatal error, i.e. the document is OK and there
> really isn't enough capacity,

IMNSHO, almost never.

> and how often is it the result of an error in the document?

Almost always, in my case.

Peter

Scott Pakin

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Sep 14, 2021, 5:44:45 PM9/14/21
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Hard to answer. I got the error just three days ago due to there really
not being enough capacity. Probably most of the time, though, it's due
to an error in the document, such as an infinite loop.

-- Scott

P.S. In case you're interested, the lack of capacity was due to a very
complicated TikZ graphic. See
https://github.com/samcarter/TikZbricks/pull/3 for what I was trying to
draw. In my case, LuaLaTeX was already configured with enough capacity
to handle the document even though pdfLaTeX threw a "! TeX capacity
exceeded" error.

Dr Eberhard Lisse

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Sep 15, 2021, 5:55:13 AM9/15/21
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Fascinating edge case.

I would of course just includegraphics it but if one is bored :-)-O

el

On 14/09/2021 23:44, Scott Pakin wrote:
>...]
> P.S. In case you're interested, the lack of capacity was due to a very
> complicated TikZ graphic. See
> https://github.com/samcarter/TikZbricks/pull/3 for what I was trying
> to draw. In my case, LuaLaTeX was already configured with enough
> capacity to handle the document even though pdfLaTeX threw a "! TeX
> capacity exceeded" error.

Bernhard Kleine

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Sep 17, 2021, 4:02:29 AM9/17/21
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This type of error gives reason to check the (closing) braces. In the
earlier days I had to adjust tex.conf but that has been maybe 10 years
earlier.
With the use of something like texstudio that error has not happened for
some time.

Kind regards.

Jean-Côme Charpentier

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Sep 17, 2021, 7:57:55 AM9/17/21
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When I demand some hard calculation to TeX (i.e multiplicate two
operands with 10000 digits)
I've got this fatal error a 25th december a long time ago when I want
to post a card in fr.comp.text.tex with a Chrismas tree in PostScript
with *many* flashing stars and flashing tinsels... very cute :-)

Jean-Côme Charpentier
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