URL:
<https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?63587>
Summary: [troff] set .R register to maximum representable
integer
Project: GNU troff
Submitter: gbranden
Submitted: Thu 29 Dec 2022 03:52:30 AM UTC
Category: Core
Severity: 1 - Wish
Item Group: Feature change
Status: Postponed
Privacy: Public
Assigned to: None
Open/Closed: Open
Discussion Lock: Any
Planned Release: None
_______________________________________________________
Follow-up Comments:
-------------------------------------------------------
Date: Thu 29 Dec 2022 03:52:30 AM UTC By: G. Branden Robinson <gbranden>
I have a few uses in mind for .R. It is presently fixed at 10,000, which is
not presently a useful value for any particular purpose. It just means
"large", and I've never seen any code that tests it for its historical purpose
(checking for register availability, a sort of crude memory capacity test).
1. We could advise users to employ it if they want to turn on centering or
right-alignment "forever".
2. We could advise users to use it, or turn our own macro packages toward it,
for expression of an "infinite" page length.
3. If done carefully, a user could avoid integer overflow errors before
undertaking arithmetic with large magnitudes.
4. It would be easy to determine the width of the underlying integer type from
within the roff language. At present the language doesn't _really_ abstract
this, it simply lays down land mines that you blunder into if your arithmetic
gets too ambitious.
_______________________________________________________
Reply to this item at:
<https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?63587>
_______________________________________________
Message sent via Savannah
https://savannah.gnu.org/
