Hi Branden, G. Branden Robinson wrote on Tue, Dec 31, 2019 at 04:34:56PM +1100:
> I still prefer my here document because it _looks_ like an actual > groff document, and therefore more valuable for pedagogical purposes, I agree that your here document is the most readable of the three, and i also agree that readablity matters, so i even agree that losing it would be sad. > but if I have to give it up, I prefer your printf recipe to Ingo's. Yes, i agree that Ralph's printf(1) approach is better than what i did. > *roff macro writers (like us!) who can count long repeated sequences > of uninterrupted backslashes by eye with ease are to be pitied, not > emulated. While i did once maintain a program (a web application serving scientific papers written in LaTeX) where i needed \\\\\\\\ (eight consecutive backslashes) at some places, i don't claim being good at counting escapes, and i certainly hate it when i have to count escapes. I merely tried to get rid of what i took for a bashism; the proposed cure certainly wasn't perfect, and i'm no longer sure what exactly needs to be fixed in this respect, if anything. I won't touch this here document until it's clear whether there is an ksh(1) bug. Working on shell bugs tends to be very time comsuming, so there may be a substantial delay, which shouldn't be a problem because this doesn't harm groff's usefulness. Yours, Ingo
