Works fine here on the same version.
Thanks for testing. Then it must have been something messed up in trying a TEXMFLOCAL update. Oh, just found it. kpathsea wasn't finding my cont-sys.tex (in ~/texmf/tex/context/user/cont-sys.tex), so these values were not set: \runMPgraphicstrue \runMPTEXgraphicstrue Yet the cont-sys.tex file is there. Magic: When I deleted the ls-R database, cont-sys.tex became visible. Obviously I don't understand how kpathsea works. I thought a path element (in texmf.cnf) without a !! in front meant kpathsea would search the filesystem as well as the ls-R. So deleting the ls-R should not change "not found" to "found", since it should have searched the disk anyway. Anyhow it's okay now. Maybe the ls-R had a cont-sys.tex but in the wrong location, so it didn't bother to search the disk. TeX file searching is a god awful, fragile mess! -Sanjoy `Never underestimate the evil of which men of power are capable.' --Bertrand Russell, _War Crimes in Vietnam_, chapter 1.