Master/texmf-dist/doc/generic/FAQ-en/html/FAQ-nonpdfsp.html


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<title>UK TeX FAQ -- question label nonpdfsp</title>
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<h3>Non-PDF special ignored!</h3>
<p/>This is a PDFTeX error: PDFTeX is running in PDF output

mode, and it has encountered a 
<a href="FAQ-specials.html"><code>\</code><code>special</code></a> command.  PDFTeX is
able to generate its own output, and in this mode of operation has no
need of <code>\</code><code>special</code> commands (which allow the user to pass
information to the driver being used to generate output).
<p/>Why does this happen?  LaTeX users, nowadays, hardly ever use
<code>\</code><code>special</code> commands on their own &mdash; they employ packages to do the
job for them.  Some packages will generate <code>\</code><code>special</code> commands
however they are invoked: <i>pstricks</i> is an example (it&rsquo;s very
raison d&rsquo;&ecirc;tre is to emit PostScript code in a sequence of <code>\</code><code>special</code>
commands).  <i>Pstricks</i> may be dealt with by other means (the
<i>pdftricks</i> package offers a usable technique).
<p/>More amenable to correction, but more confusing, are packages (such as
<i>color</i>, <i>graphics</i> and <i>hyperref</i>) that
specify a &ldquo;driver&rdquo;.  These packages have plug-in modules that
determine what <code>\</code><code>special</code> (or other commands) are needed to generate
any given effect: the <code>pdftex</code> driver for such packages knows not to
generate <code>\</code><code>special</code> commands.  In most circumstances, you can let
the system itself choose which driver you need; in this case
everything will act properly when you switch to using PDFLaTeX.  If
you&rsquo;ve been using <i>dvips</i> (and specifying the <code>dvips</code> driver)
or <i>dvipdfm</i> (for which you have to specify the driver), and
decide to try PDFLaTeX, you <em>must</em> remove the <code>dvips</code> or
<code>dvipdfm</code> driver specification from the package options, and let the
system recognise which driver is needed.
<dl>
<dt><tt><i>pdftricks.sty</i></tt><dd><a href="ftp://cam.ctan.org/tex-archive/macros/latex/contrib/pdftricks.zip">macros/latex/contrib/pdftricks</a> (<a href="ftp://cam.ctan.org/tex-archive/macros/latex/contrib/pdftricks.tar.gz">gzipped tar</a>, <a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/tex-archive/macros/latex/contrib/pdftricks/">browse</a>)
<dt><tt><i>pstricks.sty</i></tt><dd><a href="ftp://cam.ctan.org/tex-archive/graphics/pstricks.zip">graphics/pstricks</a> (<a href="ftp://cam.ctan.org/tex-archive/graphics/pstricks.tar.gz">gzipped tar</a>, <a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/tex-archive/graphics/pstricks/">browse</a>)
</dl>
<p/><p>This question on the Web: <a href="http://www.tex.ac.uk/cgi-bin/texfaq2html?label=nonpdfsp">http://www.tex.ac.uk/cgi-bin/texfaq2html?label=nonpdfsp</a>
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