Hi Branden,
> If I could do something like the following: > > .if \n[.mandoc] .als MR IR > To determine if mandoc(1) is being used to format the current page, use .if \n(.f=0 This is what Mono.tmac <https://github.com/Alhadis/Mono/blob/25765171fbf676b623a4bcbf3d9f93384ef83040/ono.tmac#L6> uses to identify mandoc(1), and it works quite well: no full Troff implementation will mount a font at a position of zero, and mandoc(1) has absolutely no concept of mounting fonts, period. Regards, — John On Tue, 21 Feb 2023 at 20:19, G. Branden Robinson < g.branden.robin...@gmail.com> wrote: > Hi Alexis, > > At 2023-02-21T19:02:14+1100, Alexis wrote: > > i've just installed rc3 via the relevant Gentoo ebuild. My Gentoo > > system is mandoc-based, via the `system-man` USE flag. > > > > Running `man` - actually the `mandoc` binary - still works fine > > overall, but not with the new groff man pages. For example, `man > > groff_man_style` produces this as the entirety of its output: > > > > --- ✂ --- > > groff_man_style(7) Miscellaneous Information Manual > groff_man_style(7) > > > > Name > > groff_man_style - GNU roff man page tutorial and style guide > > > > groff 1.23.0.rc3 21 February 2023 groff_man_style(7) > > --- ✂ --- > > I can reproduce this (with mandoc 1.14.5-1 in Debian bullseye). > > > On the other hand, `groff -man -Tutf8 > /usr/share/man/man7/groff_man_style.7` > > works just fine. > > Yes. (You'll want a "-t" in there too, for the tables.) > > > Is there something in 1.23 that mandoc needs to be updated to support? > > Yes. And it's something mandoc maintainer Ingo Schwarze doesn't really > want to support. Or, at least, my recollection is that he expressed > great reluctance about doing so the last time he participated in a > discussion of it on this list. It's been some months since we've seen > him, sadly. It was just about the time I started making edits to the > groff_mdoc(7) man page... > > Ironically enough, it was a recent change (see below) taking into > account Ingo's advice for how to proceed with what he considered an > ill-advised new macro (MR) that has caused the groff man pages to > malfunction so badly with mandoc(1). > > A sufficiently enthusiastic mandoc partisan may consider this a feature, > not a bug, if it drives people away from using groff at all... > > > Or, more likely, am i just doing something wrong, or not doing > > something right? > > Nope, you did nothing wrong. > > You can take out the following material from groff man pages: > > .\" Define fallback for groff 1.23's MR macro if the system lacks it. > .de @@ > . de MR > . ie \n(.$=1 \ > . I %\$1 > . el \ > . IR %\$1 (\$2)\$3 > . \\. > .. > .if \n(.g .if !d MR .@@ > .if !\n(.g .@@ > .rm @@ > > (*roff experts: yes, there is a stupid mistake in the above[1]. I will > fix it.) > > ...and a lot more will render, but crucially, the man page cross > references will be gone, which is why I put in the above hack in the > first place (on 3 February[2]), and which I would like to dispose of for > groff 1.24 or so. > > While I'm unhappy to see mandoc(1) doing this, I think it's preferable > to the _subtle_ omission of man page cross references. With the > severely truncated output you're seeing, it is at least obvious to the > user that something is wrong. > > mandoc is not a true *roff language interpreter, so I am not aware of > anything I can do in the groff man pages to work around mandoc's lack of > support for this feature. > > If I could do something like the following: > > .if \n[.mandoc] .als MR IR > > ...in groff's man pages to accommodate mandoc(1), I would, happily. But > mandoc, to the best of my knowledge, simply isn't designed to do things > like alias macros. > > Incidentally, I don't blame mandoc(1) for not being able to parse that > stuff I pasted up there. > > This is a problem, and I don't think it can be resolved without help > from mandoc(1). The alternative--ripping out what I consider to be > groff 1.23 man(7)'s signature feature--is not something I am willing to > do (see the "News" item in the RC3 announcement for why I think `MR` is > important). > > There is a set of people who feel that man pages should be composed only > in mdoc(7) and rendered only with mandoc(1). I am not one of them. > > The easiest thing for mandoc(1) to do is to treat `MR` as a near synonym > of `IR` (or `BR`), slapping parentheses around the second argument. It > does not have to do any of the hyperlinking or OSC 8 stuff that groff's > implementation does. I have no problem working on (and, if successful, > contributing) a patch for this, but I have two major tasks in my queue > _after_ groff 1.23.0 final to take care of first. > > Thank you very much for raising this issue before the final release; > this is an important matter that needs to be warned about in the > announcement. > > If you'd like to share your/a surname, I can credit you by your full > name as a contributor in the release announcement (as you saw in the rc3 > email). By bringing this matter to my attention, you have spared me > embarrassment.[1 again] Otherwise, like Gene in the same credits, you > can remain mononymous, if potentially ambiguous. :) > > Regards, > Branden > > [1] You may have noticed the startling paucity of backslashes in the > macro definition. I tested my change, but forgot that I had a > fallback definition of `MR` in my /etc/groff/man.local, so the > alternative definition within the man page was never interpreted. > > I _hate_ working under deadline pressure. You may see why I try to > avoid doing so. This is why I would prefer to have someone else > serving as groff release engineer who can say, "it's good enough to > ship". They can catch me in a lull, not a frenzy. And I will > seldom feel frenzied if I don't have to meet a deadline. > > [2] The backslash quantity didn't look stupid when I was writing the > change, because I wrote it in sed. > > > https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/groff.git/commit/?id=18d708e489758636ff9e168eee2592591755eb61 > > The quantity of backslashes in the fix is going to be truly > dizzying. I know--I'll just temporarily change the escape > character. Surely Ingo won't buy a plane ticket and fly overseas > just to kill me. ;-) > > (No, I won't change the escape character in our man pages.) >
