>Then again my CD has over 5000 tfm files. If I do
> \font\foo=foo.tfm
>you are going to have to look at all of them, arent you? hard to see
>how to cut that down rationally.

With a file structure that is more than a stream of bytes.

VMS has file *records* and *indexed* files.  VMS *should* be able to
do a binary search for a file name in a directory file.  If you
break your inputs directory into a zillion subdirectories then
there is no rational way to search that tree.  Does the TDS commit
such a foul crime?

Anyway, it is not VMS TeX that needs its own hashed database of input
files.  What a kluge!

Donald Arseneau                         [log in to unmask]