Hi Doug,
> .NP certainly wasn't there in the beginning, and -ms has been very
> stable in the 35 years since. If my guess that it would mean "new
> page" is right, the feature would be out of character--why give a new
> name to an existing request?
I've done some more digging. 7th Ed.'s usr/lib/tmac/tmac.s has `.wh 0
NP' and NP is called by EM too. It's definition is later,
. \"NP new page
.de NP
.if \\n(FM+\\n(HM>=\\n(.p .tm Margins bigger than page length.
.if \\n(FM+\\n(HM>=\\n(.p .ab
.if \\n(FM+\\n(HM>=\\n(.p .ex
.nr PX \\n(.s
.nr PF \\n(.f
.if t .CM
.if \\n(HM=0 .nr HM 1i
'sp \\n(HMu/2u
.lt \\n(LTu
.ps \\n(PS
.ft 1
.if \\n(PO>0 .po \\n(POu
.PT
.ps \\n(PX
.ft \\n(PF
'sp |\\n(HMu
.nr XX 0 1
.nr YY 0-\\n(FMu
.ch FO 16i
.ch FX 17i
.ch FO -\\n(FMu
.ch FX \\n(.pu-\\n(FMu
.if \\n(MF .FV
.nr MF 0
.mk
.os
.ev 1
.if \\n(TD=0 .if \\n(TC<5 .XK
.nr TC 0
.ns
.ev
.nr TQ \\n(.i
.nr TK \\n(.u
.if \\n(IT>0 \{\
. in 0
. nf
. TT
. in \\n(TQu
. if \\n(TK .fi\
\}
.mk #T
.if t .if \\n(.o+\\n(LL>7.75i .tm Offset + line length exceeds 7.75 inches,
too wide
..
So it's stuff to do at the start of a new page, not to get one.
Lesk's `Typing Documents on the UNIX System: Using the \-ms Macros with
Troff and Nroff' from that edition, found in /usr/doc/msmacros/ms makes
no mention of an NP macro, but does list NP in the `String registers
used in -ms' table at the end, which seems a way of warning the user off
trampling the internal macro given they share a namespace with strings.
So Keith's right, an internal feature, probably not for Anton to find in
a re-implementation.
Cheers, Ralph.
