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+CREATING A LAN INSTALLATION OF TEX LIVE FOR WINDOWS CLIENTS
+
+You can copy a TeX Live installation to a read-only network drive
+and tell your users to add the <root>\bin\win32 directory to their
+searchpath. However, this is not how things are done on the Windows
+platform.
+
+The w32client.bat/w32client script pair modifies the searchpath,
+creates shortcuts and creates file associations. It also registers
+an uninstaller script which will show up under Add/Remove Programs.
+
+Consider these scripts prototypes. You may want to add a GUI which
+lets the user choose whether [s]he wants any of those things.
+
+As it stands, all changes are made for the user, not for the
+workstation. This implies that in a roaming profile setup the
+configuration is available from any computer on the network, and
+that the user needs no particular rights on the workstation.
+
+REQUIREMENTS OF THE NETWORK INSTALLATION
+
+The prototype script assumes a standard directory layout:
+<parent>---<year>
+ | |
+ | +---bin---win32
+ | +---texmf
+ | +---texmf-dist
+ | +---texmf-config
+ | +---texmf-var
+ | +---tlpkg
+ |
+ +---texmf-local
+
+The w32client- and w32unclient scripts assume that they are in the
+root of the installation, i.e. in <parent>\<year>.
+
+Sticking to this default directory layout minimizes configuration
+hassles. Still, there may be some:
+
+XETEX
+
+For XeTeX to support system fonts, it needs some information about
+those fonts. For Windows, this information normally is collected by
+a utiltity fc-cache during installation of XeTeX.
+
+If all computers on the network have the same set of fonts, and if
+the installation was created from such a computer, then XeTeX font
+support might work perfectly without additional action.
+
+However, it is better not to count on this, and to run fc-cache from
+the client script. Since users don't have write access to
+TEXMFSYSVAR, or <parent>\<year>\texmf-var, we need to use TEXMFVAR,
+or <user profile>\.texlive<year>\texmf-var. This can be accomplished
+with a file <parent>\<year>\texmf.cnf with the lines
+
+FONTCONFIG_PATH=$TEXMFVAR/fonts/conf
+FC_CACHEDIR=$TEXMFVAR/fonts/cache
+
+The file should already exist, but would still be empty apart from
+some comments. Settings here override settings in the main
+texmf.cnf, in <parent>\<year>\texmf\web2c.
+
+Users may need to rerun fc-cache if they move to another workstation
+with a different set of fonts.
+
+SEARCH PATH
+
+If a workstation already has a locally installed TeX and if its
+binaries are on the system path, then the locally installed TeX will
+be found first. The demo script safeguards against this by
+prepending the searchpath with the TeX Live binaries for individual
+shortcuts. Wrapper scripts also do this, so the TeXworks shortcut
+will always find our TeX Live first.
+
+In addition, w32client adds a command-prompt shortcut with such a
+locally patched searchpath.
+
+VISTA
+
+Under some circumstances, Vista needs to be told that a program or
+batchfile doesn't require admin privileges. This can be done with a
+manifest file, which has the name of the program, including
+extension, with `.manifest' appended. In my own tests, I had to
+create a manifest file w32unclient.bat.manifest for the uninstaller.
+
+If you need additional manifest files, just copy this manifest file
+and replace the program name in it.