Update of bug #66174 (group groff):
Item Group: Documentation => Incorrect behaviour
Status: In Progress => Invalid
Open/Closed: Open => Closed
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Follow-up Comment #4:
Oh, I'm wrong! Or, rather, _groff_mdoc_(7) is less poorly documented than I
thought.
The information is there. It's just buried under bad pedagogy.
But it *is* there.
-width ⟨string⟩ If ⟨string⟩ starts with a ‘.’ (dot)
immediately
followed by a valid mdoc macro name, interpret
⟨string⟩ and use the width of the result. Almost
all lists in this document use this option.
Example:
.Bl -tag -width ".Fl test Ao Ar string Ac"
.It Fl test Ao Ar string Ac
This is a longer sentence to show how the
.Fl width
flag works in combination with a tag list.
.El
gives:
-test ⟨string⟩ This is a longer sentence to show
how the -width flag works in
combination with a tag list.
(Note that the current state of mdoc is saved
before ⟨string⟩ is interpreted; afterward, all
variables are restored again. However, boxes
(used for enclosures) can’t be saved in GNU
troff(1); as a consequence, arguments must always
be balanced to avoid nasty errors. For example,
do not write ‘.Ao Ar string’ but ‘.Ao Ar string
Xc’ instead if you really need only an opening
angle bracket.)
Otherwise, if ⟨string⟩ is a valid numeric
expression (with a scaling indicator other than
‘u’), use that value for indentation. The most
useful scaling indicators are ‘m’ and ‘n’,
specifying the so‐called Em and En square. This
is approximately the width of the letters ‘m’ and
‘n’ respectively of the current font (for nroff
output, both scaling indicators give the same
values). If ⟨string⟩ isn’t a numeric
expression,
it is tested whether it is an mdoc macro name,
and the default width value associated with this
macro is used. Finally, if all tests fail, the
width of ⟨string⟩ (typeset with a fixed‐width
font) is taken as the width.
If a width is not specified for the tag list
type, ‘6n’ is used.
If you can get through all that, then _groff_ is rendering the _erb3.1_(1) man
page exactly as documented.
So I was also wrong that the "string" argument to the "-width" option can be
interpreted as two different things.
It's actually three.
Whee!
<facepalm>
Yeah, it's *so unfair* that _mdoc_ didn't just eat all of _man_'s lunch and
leave it whimpering on the schoolroom floor.
Whatever.
Considering design decisions like this, the world dodged a bullet.
I'd like to do editorial violence to the _groff_mdoc_(7) page but that will
have to wait for _groff_ 1.25 at the earliest.
Closing as invalid. I ask again that your report this problem to the Ruby
developers.
They could, ya know, switch to _man_(7)... 😈
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