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Just installed MacTex with brew and then updated MacTex on my son's MacBook.

Opened LaTeXiT and immediately see two errors:

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ghostscript not found or does not work as expected The current configuration of LaTeXiT requires ghostscript to work. Unless you have installed X11, you should be sure that you use a version of ghostscript that does not require it (usually gs-nox11 instead of gs). Find ghostscript... What's that? Cancel

ps2pdf not found or does not work as expected The current configuration of LaTeXiT requires ps2pdf to work. Find ps2pdf... What's that? Cancel

I then installed XQuartz using homebrew. Still problem remains.

Brew says it's installed.

john@MacBook1415 ~ % brew search ghostscript
==> Formulae
ghostscript ✔

Looking at the brew implementation from another mac:

12:38:46.642 at iMac191 ~ brew info mactex
==> mactex: 2023.0314
https://www.tug.org/mactex/
Not installed
From: https://github.com/Homebrew/homebrew-cask/blob/HEAD/Casks/m/mactex.rb
==> Name
MacTeX
==> Description
Full TeX Live distribution with GUI applications
==> Artifacts
mactex-20230314.pkg (Pkg)
==> Caveats
You must restart your terminal window for the installation of MacTeX CLI
tools to take effect.

Alternatively, Bash and Zsh users can run the command:


eval "$(/usr/libexec/path_helper)"


==> Analytics
install: 2,518 (30 days), 7,385 (90 days), 18,382 (365 days)
John
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    see also answer by atom here: https://superuser.com/questions/1787105/where-are-gs-x11-and-gs-nox11-on-my-mac – Steve Heim Feb 15 '24 at 13:42

1 Answers1

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The binaries were installed... I just had to point to correct directory. Maybe because we are on Apple Silicon M1+ and not Intel - the homebrew install paths are different. This should be looked at by the package manager.

Intel:
/usr/local/bin
Apple Silicon M1+:
/opt/homebrew

Also important to know that we are searching for term "gs" and not "ghostscript"!

Both binaries are found at these paths on Apple Silicon M1+:

john@MacBook1415 ghostscript % echo $PATH
/opt/homebrew/bin:/opt/homebrew/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/System/Cryptexes/App/usr/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/var/run/com.apple.security.cryptexd/codex.system/bootstrap/usr/local/bin:/var/run/com.apple.security.cryptexd/codex.system/bootstrap/usr/bin:/var/run/com.apple.security.cryptexd/codex.system/bootstrap/usr/appleinternal/bin:/opt/X11/bin:/Library/TeX/texbin
john@MacBook1415 ghostscript % which gs
/opt/homebrew/bin/gs
john@MacBook1415 ghostscript % which ps2pdf
/opt/homebrew/bin/ps2pdf
John
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  • Welcome to TeX.SE! That should be better an edit or your question, I guess? – Mensch Nov 23 '23 at 21:10
  • A standard MacTeX install installs ghostscript in /usr/local/bin so that path should have worked. Now that you've installed a version with homebrew then these paths are correct, however. @Mensch No, this is a good answer to the question. – Alan Munn Nov 23 '23 at 23:43
  • @AlanMunn /usr/local/bin is the incorrect directory for Apple Silicon M1+ machines. Homebrew on Apple Silicon M1+ installs into /opt/homebrew. For each account on my son's MacBook I had to show LaTeXiT where to find the binaries. This is a new first time install of any tex package. – John Nov 24 '23 at 18:16
  • @John If ghostscript is installed by the MacTeX installer (which it is) and not Homebrew, it will be located in /usr/local/bin Only a Homebrew installed ghostscript will be in /opt/homebrew/bin. This has nothing to do with which chip the Mac has. – Alan Munn Nov 24 '23 at 18:20
  • It's better to install MacTeX from its installer rather than use Homebrew to install it since most applications assume a standard MacTeX installation not a Homebrew one, hence your need to change paths. – Alan Munn Nov 24 '23 at 18:37
  • Thank you. I understand. I think the homebrew package manager might want to consider adding a "Caveat" or create a .config file pointing to where binaries can be found depending on which location it uses for installs (depends on chip Mac has). Does MacTeX use a configuration file? AFAIK ghostscript was installed by homebrew... that misconception may have led me astray. – John Nov 24 '23 at 19:00