MPOST(1) General Commands Manual MPOST(1)
NAME
mpost, pmpost, upmpost - MetaPost, a system for creating graphics r-
mpost, r-pmpost, r-upmpost - restricted MetaPost
SYNOPSIS
mpost [options] [commands]
mpost --dvitomp dvifile[.dvi] [mpxfile[.mpx]]
DESCRIPTION
MetaPost interprets the MetaPost language and produces PostScript (EPS)
or Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) pictures. The MetaPost language is
similar to Knuth's Metafont with additional features for including
tex(1) or troff(1) commands and accessing features of PostScript not
found in Metafont.
MetaPost is normally used with a set of basic macros, and it will use
its executable name as the name of the preload file to use. For exam-
ple, when called as mpost the mpost.mp file is used, which simply reads
plain.mp. When the --ini option is given, preloading does not happen.
The commands given on the command line to the MetaPost program are
passed to it as the first input line. (But it is often easier to type
extended arguments as the first input line, since UNIX shells tend to
gobble up or misinterpret MetaPost's favorite symbols, like semicolons,
unless you quote them.) The normal usage is to say mpost figs to process
the file figs.mp. The basename of figs becomes the ``jobname'', and is
used in forming output file names. If no file is named, the jobname be-
comes mpout. The default extension, .mp, can be overridden by specify-
ing an extension explicitly.
When the --dvitomp option is given, MetaPost acts as DVI-to-MPX con-
verter only. See dvitomp (1) for details.
The pmpost program is a variant with Japanese support, and upmpost has
Unicode-enabled Japanese support, analogous to ptex and uptex.
All three variants are also installed with an `r-' prefix, that is, r-
mpost, r-pmpost, r-upmpost, which implicitly specify the --restricted
option to make MetaPost safe to run on unknown input; the tex, makempx,
and editor commands are disabled.
This manual page is a mere skeleton. For a list of all command line op-
tions, run --help.
The main documentation for this version of MetaPost can be found in the
User Manual that should have been installed along with the program and
is also available from https://tug.org/metapost.
The MetaPost language is similar to Metafont, but the manual assumes no
knowledge of Metafont. MetaPost does not have bitmap output commands or
Metafont's online display mechanism.
FILES
plain.mp
The standard preload file.
mfplain.mp
The Metafont-compatible preload file.
$TEXMFMAIN/metapost/base/*.mp
The standard MetaPost macros included in the original distribu-
tion.
$TEXMFMAIN/metapost/support/*
Various tables for handling included tex and troff.
$TEXMFMAIN/metapost/support/trfonts.map
Table of corresponding font names for troff and PostScript.
psfonts.map
Table of corresponding font names for tex and PostScript.
$TEXMFMAIN/doc/metapost/*
The MetaPost manual and tutorial source, also including sample
figures
SUGGESTED READING
Donald E. Knuth, The Metafontbook (Volume C of Computers and Typeset-
ting), Addison-Wesley, 1986, ISBN 0-201-13445-4.
TUGboat (the journal of the TeX Users Group).
SEE ALSO
dvitomp(1), epstopdf(1), mf(1), mptopdf(1), tex(1),
MetaPost home page ⟨https://tug.org/metapost/⟩.
AUTHORS
MetaPost was created by John D. Hobby, incorporating algorithms from
Metafont by Donald E. Knuth. It was originally implemented on Unix, in-
corporating system-dependent routines from web2c, while not relying on
it except for the actual Web-to-C translator.
Ulrik Vieth adapted MetaPost to take advantage of the advanced path
searching features in more recent versions of web2c and worked towards
fully integrating MetaPost into the canonical Unix TeX distribution.
The primary author of the current MetaPost was Taco Hoekwater, with as-
sistance from Hans Hagen and many others. It is currently maintained by
Luigi Scarso.
BUGS
The MetaPost home page is https://tug.org/metapost.
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