[Groff] Re: Info versus man

The GNU project has tried for years to kill man pages (with little success) by ignoring them. I'm not proposing that texinfo get ignored, I'm suggesting that there is at least one person out here (me) who would do some real work on roff's docs if the format was roff. From what I ca

Re: [Groff] Introduction

On Monday 24 Oct 2005 21:40, you wrote: > Deri, > > Are the barcodes generated by troff? (A special font?) > > Or are they images that are generated, and then something like .PSPIC > glues them into the documents? I generate the bar code directly, using interleaved 2of5. (GPLed font here:-

Re: Re: [Groff] Introduction

On Mon, Oct 24, 2005 at 09:26:51PM +0100, Deri James wrote: > : > Groff is used > in the final stage to actually typeset the report, including a barcode on > each page to control the "finishing" at the printers, ... Deri, Are the barcodes generated by troff? (A special font?) Or are the

Re: [Groff] Introduction

On Thursday 20 Oct 2005 19:46, Larry Kollar wrote: > Is anyone collecting the "reasons for using groff" that have been > going by in this thread? Such a collection would be a fine beginning > to an advocacy/"Why Use groff" chapter in UTP (or a standalone web > page). I'd be particularly interested

Re: [Groff] Re: Info versus man

> First, we should all acknowledge that groff's info files are among > the best of any open-source project (again, there's some irony > here); [..] too much honour... > any alternative documentation project undertaken by members of this > list should strive to incorporate all of the exhaustive >

Re: [Groff] Re: [Mingw-users] Spelling Tip

On Oct 24, 2005, at 7:43 AM, Jeremy Bettis wrote: Or perhaps that separate has (sep)A RAT(e) in it. - Original Message - From: "Keith MARSHALL" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Sent: Monday, October 24, 2005 6:38 AM Subject: [Mingw-users] Spelling Tip Or perhaps that t

[Groff] Re: [Mingw-users] Spelling Tip

Or perhaps that separate has (sep)A RAT(e) in it. - Original Message - From: "Keith MARSHALL" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>; Sent: Monday, October 24, 2005 6:38 AM Subject: [Mingw-users] Spelling Tip Citing no one in particular, and without intending any offence, I've

Re: [Groff] Centering pictures and captions with mm

On Mon, 24 Oct 2005, Daniel de Kok wrote: I have enclosed the picture and display in a block. Sorry for this error, this should read "I have enclosed the picture and caption in a display block." -- Daniel ___ Groff mailing list Groff@gnu.org http

[Groff] Centering pictures and captions with mm

Hi, I have a fairly newbie-ish question about the mm marcos. I have some pictures that I would like to center. To keep the captions of the image on the same page, I have enclosed the picture and display in a block. The problem that I have is that with setting the display formatting to CB, the

Re: [Groff] Re: Info versus man

On Oct 24, 2005, at 9:46 AM, Larry McVoy wrote: On Mon, Oct 24, 2005 at 08:36:43AM -0600, D. E. Evans wrote: Perhaps only rms, and a couple of others actually use 'GNU OS,' but those who do, use info. I wouldn't say they it is right to call all GNU OS users, developers. This sounds like

Re: [Groff] Re: Info versus man

On Mon, Oct 24, 2005 at 08:36:43AM -0600, D. E. Evans wrote: >> Perhaps only rms, and a couple of others actually use 'GNU OS,' >> but those who do, use info. I wouldn't say they it is right to >> call all GNU OS users, developers. > >This sounds like you are basing your arguments

[Groff] Re: Info versus man

> Perhaps only rms, and a couple of others actually use 'GNU OS,' > but those who do, use info. I wouldn't say they it is right to > call all GNU OS users, developers. This sounds like you are basing your arguments on people who use a 100% pure GNU system. If that's the case, that

Re: [Groff] Info versus man

On Mon, Oct 24, 2005 at 08:14:57AM -0600, D. E. Evans wrote: >> So again, a *GNU* user will be looking to info everytime, not a >> man page. > >Wrong. A GNU *developer* may look to info; judging by the tone of > > Perhaps only rms, and a couple of others actually use 'GNU OS,' > but

[Groff] Re: Info versus man

Having info as the only default is an unfortunate decision IMHO. It makes sense for big projects, but otherwise this guideline should be ignored, or rather, the man page should have priority. I don't remember the details, but I seem to remember Stallman's reasoning was Donald Knuth's inv

[Groff] Re: Info versus man

> So again, a *GNU* user will be looking to info everytime, not a > man page. As a BSD user, I would look to a man page everytime, > since man is the default for BSD (as for any other UNIX platform). > The irony of groff as a GNU project is not lost on me. I'm sorry, but I can't he

[Groff] Info versus man

> So again, a *GNU* user will be looking to info everytime, not a > man page. Wrong. A GNU *developer* may look to info; judging by the tone of Perhaps only rms, and a couple of others actually use 'GNU OS,' but those who do, use info. I wouldn't say they it is right to call all GNU OS

Re: [Groff] Introduction

Robert Goulding wrote, quoting me: >> It isn't difficult to conceive a groff macro package, which, when used >> with `groff -Tascii -mroff2txi` for example, would spit out texinfo >> source... > > Why go to texinfo, rather than directly to info? Because, at the time I was looking for a mechanism f

Re: [Groff] Introduction

> Why go to texinfo, rather than directly to info? I think this is impossible without the help of additional programs. Werner ___ Groff mailing list Groff@gnu.org http://lists.gnu.org/mailman/listinfo/groff

Re: [Groff] Introduction

> Indeed, before I embarked on the development of pdfmark.tmac, I did > create a rudimentary implementation, mimicking a subset of the ms > macros, which would do just that. As proof of concept, it worked, > but the eventual output from texinfo, formatted as either PDF or > HTML, was of such disap

Re: [Groff] Re: Introduction

> The GNU OS developer guidelines are explicit in demanding info as > the default, and in suggesting that man pages may not be suitable > for a project. This is true. On the other hand, even Emacs comes with a fine man page, describing its command line switches (it says that it will only be updat

Re: [Groff] Re: Introduction

> On the one hand I find that texinfo is an excellent means to write > technical documentation with TeX (it is much better than LaTeX in > that respect, but I take mm instead anyday), but as a replacement to > man pages failed and it did it 15 years ago already. Yes. info pages can't replace man

Re: [Groff] Re: Introduction

On 10/24/05, D. E. Evans wrote: > > So again, a *GNU* user will be looking to info everytime, not a > man page. As a BSD user, I would look to a man page everytime, > since man is the default for BSD (as for any other UNIX platform). > The irony of groff as a GNU project is not lost on me. I'm s

Re: [Groff] Re: Introduction

D. E. Evans wrote: > The GNU OS developer guidelines are explicit in demanding info as > the default, and in suggesting that man pages may not be suitable > for a project. Exactly so. These are *developer* guidelines, for which the user won't care two hoots. So, playing Devil's Advocate... > So

Re: [Groff] Introduction

On Oct 24, 2005, at 3:30 AM, Keith MARSHALL wrote: Werner Lemberg wrote, quoting Larry McVoy: And as the primary whiner on this topic, I'll volunteer to do the work to convert the existing texinfo docs to roff. This is a great offer, but I wonder whether it makes sense to use the time you ar

Re: [Groff] Re: Introduction

On 10/24/05, Keith MARSHALL wrote: > [Concerning the availability of man vs. info pages] > > D. E. Evans wrote: > > I agree. However, as a GNU program, GNU users are going to > > automatically look at info, not man... > > Says who? I'm a GNU/Linux user, and I will go for the man page > first, eve

[Groff] Re: Introduction

D. E. Evans wrote: > I agree. However, as a GNU program, GNU users are going to > automatically look at info, not man... Says who? I'm a GNU/Linux user, and I will go for the man page first, every time. The GNU OS developer guidelines are explicit in demanding info as the default

[Groff] Spelling Tip

Citing no one in particular, and without intending any offence, I've noticed this common misspelling of `separate', in several recent posts. > I think the manual should be maintained seperately and simply as a > basic reference... Now, while I don't claim to be a paragon of spelling perfection, f

Re: [Groff] Re: Introduction

[Concerning the availability of man vs. info pages] D. E. Evans wrote: > I agree. However, as a GNU program, GNU users are going to > automatically look at info, not man... Says who? I'm a GNU/Linux user, and I will go for the man page first, every time. As others have said, it is intensely ir

Re: [Groff] Introduction

Werner Lemberg wrote, quoting Larry McVoy: >> And as the primary whiner on this topic, I'll volunteer to do the >> work to convert the existing texinfo docs to roff. > > This is a great offer, but I wonder whether it makes sense to use > the time you are willing to invest in a better way. > > . I

Re: [Groff] Colors, PowerPoint and PDFs

Dear Gabriel, I believe the gpresent web site says that groff is required -- the old troff just doesn't do it (for instance, with color). Yup: "Requirements groff (version 1.18.1 dated Oct 3, 2002 or higher/later) with the mm macros (included with groff) -- groff.ffii.org perl (version 5.x) for pre