How to handle old source needing floatflt.sty?

Question

I just updated to latest version of texlive (2011) for mac and suddenly I don't have the floatflt.sty any longer. It seems it has changed license and is no longer shipped with the distributions. (A bit of a shock considering I have been told that LaTeX is not like MS Word in that it is very backwards version compatible but I guess that discussion is for another day...)

Problem is though that I have a lot of old documents using it, so now I wonder the following:

1. What are the alternatives that I can use instead and how complicated is the conversion of my old document?

2. Given that my usage is okey okey according to this new license, how do I install it on my tex live system on my mac?

EDIT: When I try to download the DTX and INS files from http://www.ctan.org/tex-archive/macros/latex/contrib/floatflt and run tex floatflt.ins I get:

$ tex floatflt.ins
This is TeX, Version 3.1415926 (TeX Live 2011)
(./floatflt.ins
! Undefined control sequence.
l.25 \NeedsTeXFormat
                    {LaTeX2e}[1996/12/01]
?

Answer 1

Update: floatflt is now again part of TeX Live (2011) after the license issue which lead to its removal from it has been solved. An update of the existing installation will install it, e.g. try tlmgr install floatflt or even tlmgr update --self --all for a complete update.

---

LaTeX itself tends to be very well backwards compatible and most of its package (written by different people) are it as well. However, a (La)TeX distribution like TeX Live might decide to not include older packages any longer. You should differ between these three things.

You can still get the floatflt package from CTAN: http://www.ctan.org/tex-archive/macros/latex/contrib/floatflt. Just download the DTX and INS file and run latex floatflt.ins with both files in one folder. It will unpack the floatflt.sty package file. Copy this file to $TEXMF/tex/latex/floatflt/floatflt.sty (where $TEXMF is your local TEXMF structure, like $HOME/texmf for Linux). You might also need to update the package database (e.g. using texhash). You can also just place the package file in (all) your document folder(s) instead.

About the license: It can be found in the floatflt.ins file and states:

You may use the `floatflt' package freely, but at your own
risk.  The authors of floatflt.dtx and floatflt.ins (the
complete `floatflt' package distribution) can not be held
responsible for any consequence of your using any of these
files, or files created from these, including hardware,
software, and data damage.  You may not make any changes to
the files floatflt.dtx or floatflt.ins.  You are allowed to make 
changes to the `\documentclass' and/or `\usepackage' commands 
of the file `floatexm.tex'.  You may incorporate
the code from these files in other files under different
names, provided the original authors are given full credit for
their work and that you yourself take the complaints from the
user(s) of your file(s).  You may freely distribute the
files floatflt.dtx and floatflt.ins, provided that you
always distribute `floatflt.dtx' and `floatflt.ins' together
at the same time. 

So in fact it is a free license at least for the version which is on CTAN, despite that it is listed there as "Other nonfree licenses".

---

As a replacement for in-paragraph floats you can use the wrapfig package.

Answer 2

I don't know where you got your tl2011 from, but the current version (as available through tlmgr updating) does contain floatflt.

It was removed, once it was realized that its original license forbade distribution. Someone tracked the author down, and he said to change the license to lppl. So we did, and the package is back in tl, ready for tl2012.

So try:

tlmgr update

with the names of packages you need up-to-date. (Personally I would add the flag --all, but that would involve an awful lot of updating.)