Unable to locate package texlive

Question

I had a problem with texlive on my ubuntu 12.10. It could not find setspace.sty and tlmgr didn't work. I googled it a little but i couldn't figure it out how to solve it (i'm a rookie)

So i removed texlive from synaptic and installed it again from iso file that i had downloaded (it's TexLive 2012).

But somehow it does not work at all now (pdflatex and etc). I checked synaptic and there is no package installed related to texlive and when when i try to remove it from terminal it shows:

E: Unable to locate package texlive

After tring sudo apt-get update it still shows the same error.

Any suggestion will be appreciated.

Solution 1

Sorry to say this, but I think you don't know what you're doing. Let me explain it a bit.

• It's texlive, not textlive.
• If you install "from upstream" (the ISO file, rather than Ubuntu packages), it's not being managed by your package management. It will not show up in any of those tools as it doesn't know about it. Please don't mix up installation from both methods - it will get you into more trouble and it will confuse your package management.
• tlmgr is supposed not to work in Ubuntu, as you should install TeX Live packages using your system package management, rather than another package management tool only for one application. This is a change that Ubuntu/Debian package managers make to software and such a change applies to many more packages. For example, the Firefox updater is disabled in the application itself - you will get it via the system package updates instead. See below one approach I use to find the right Ubuntu package.

---

Steps to get your system back in a reasonable working state:

1. Uninstall the TeXLive version you installed using that ISO file. I don't know how to properly uninstall that - it should come with instructions to do so.

2. Remove all the packages with possible leftovers as well:

   sudo apt-get remove texlive texlive-\*
   

3. Reinstall:

   sudo add-apt-repository universe
   sudo apt-get install texlive-generic-recommended
   

4. Install additional packages you need. Search the package management using the texlive- keyword for generic packages you may want. For specific missing .sty files, use the packages.ubuntu.com search, like I did here: setspace.sty search. It will show that this file is present in the texlive-latex-recommended package (which you previously didn't install I guess).

Solution 2

Seven years later, texlive-xetex was easier to find and install:

sudo apt-get update
sudo apt-get install texlive-xetex

Tested and installed on ubuntu 20.04

Comments

[tikend]

To install TexLive 2012 use this technique [How do I install the latest TeX Live 2012?][1] [1]: askubuntu.com/questions/163682/…

[gertvdijk]

@tikend That's for 12.04. I'm already writing an answer for 12.10 in his situation.

[tikend]

@gertvdijk it worked for me on 12.10 just allright

[gertvdijk]

@tikend No need for the PPA on 12.10 - it's already the 2012 version in the Ubuntu main repositories! That Q you linked is specifically about "Ubuntu 12.04 still includes the outdated and obsolete 2009 version of TeX Live."

[tikend]

@gertvdijk thx for info. didn't know that

[Anonymous5638]

After having followed the accepted answer, I still got the error message E: Unable to locate package texlive, using your code helped me resolve the error. :)