> i really wonder because all i can do is > > .if !'\V[GROFF_NO_MDOCMX]'' ... > > but what i really would like to do is rather > > .if !d \V[GROFF_NO_MDOCMX] > > so to be synchronous with $GROFF_NO_SGR. Well i am, but only on > grotty(1) level, not in the macros, which is odd. > Wouldn't it be, even more, natural to be able to use "d" for that?
\V always returns a string. If the environment variable is not defined, it returns an empty string. If `GROFF_NO_MDOCMX' is not set, your code .if !d \V[GROFF_NO_MDOCMX] expands to .if !d "" which is meaningless. It might be possible to create another interface to environment variables, but I strongly doubt that it is worth the trouble. Werner