mandoc/mdoc.7 - diff

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Diff for /mandoc/mdoc.7 between version 1.245 and 1.261

version 1.245, 2014/11/30 21:56:18

version 1.261, 2017/02/05 22:30:29

Line 1

.\" $Id$

.\"

.\" Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software for any

.\" purpose with or without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above

Line 304 Print verbose information.

\&.El

.Ed

.Pp

List the options in alphabetical order,

uppercase before lowercase for each letter and

with no regard to whether an option takes an argument.

Put digits in ascending order before all letter options.

.Pp

Manuals not documenting a command won't include the above fragment.

.Pp

Since the

Line 454 in the alphabetical

Line 459 in the alphabetical

.Op Fl compact

.It Sx \&D1 Ta indented display (one line)

.It Sx \&Dl Ta indented literal display (one line)

.It Sx \&Ql Ta in-line literal display: Ql text

.It Sx \&Bl , \&El Ta list block:

.Fl Ar type

.Op Fl width Ar val

Line 528 in the alphabetical

Line 534 in the alphabetical

.It Sx \&Dq , \&Do , \&Dc Ta enclose in typographic double quotes: Dq text

.It Sx \&Qq , \&Qo , \&Qc Ta enclose in typewriter double quotes: Qq text

.It Sx \&Sq , \&So , \&Sc Ta enclose in single quotes: Sq text

.It Sx \&Ql Ta single-quoted literal text: Ql text

.It Sx \&Pq , \&Po , \&Pc Ta enclose in parentheses: Pq text

.It Sx \&Bq , \&Bo , \&Bc Ta enclose in square brackets: Bq text

.It Sx \&Brq , \&Bro , \&Brc Ta enclose in curly braces: Brq text

Line 777 The

Line 782 The

must be one of the following:

.Bl -tag -width 13n -offset indent

.It Fl centered

Produce one output line from each input line, and centre-justify each line.

Produce one output line from each input line, and center-justify each line.

Using this display type is not recommended; many

.Nm

implementations render it poorly.

Line 822 which has no effect;

Line 827 which has no effect;

.Cm right ,

which justifies to the right margin; or

.Cm center ,

which aligns around an imagined centre axis.

which aligns around an imagined center axis.

.It

A macro invocation, which selects a predefined width

associated with that macro.

Line 1256 Examples:

Line 1261 Examples:

.Dl \&.Dl % mandoc mdoc.7 \e(ba less

.Pp

See also

.Sx \&Ql ,

.Sx \&Bd

.Fl literal ,

and

.Sx \&D1 .

.Ss \&Do

Line 1314 it should by convention be all caps.

Line 1321 it should by convention be all caps.

The manual section.

This may be one of

.Cm 1

.Pq utilities ,

.Pq General Commands ,

.Cm 2

.Pq system calls ,

.Pq System Calls ,

.Cm 3

.Pq libraries ,

.Pq Library Functions ,

.Cm 3p

.Pq Perl libraries ,

.Pq Perl Library ,

.Cm 4

.Pq devices ,

.Pq Device Drivers ,

.Cm 5

.Pq file formats ,

.Pq File Formats ,

.Cm 6

.Pq games ,

.Pq Games ,

.Cm 7

.Pq miscellaneous ,

.Pq Miscellaneous Information ,

.Cm 8

.Pq system utilities ,

.Pq System Manager's Manual ,

.Cm 9

.Pq kernel functions ,

.Cm X11

.Pq X Window System ,

.Cm X11R6

.Pq X Window System ,

.Cm unass

.Pq unassociated ,

.Cm local

.Pq local system ,

.Cm draft

.Pq draft manual ,

.Cm paper

.Cm 9

.Pq paper .

.Pq Kernel Developer's Manual .

It should correspond to the manual's filename suffix and defaults to

the empty string if unspecified.

.It Ar arch

Line 1632 See also

Line 1627 See also

A function name.

Its syntax is as follows:

.Bd -ragged -offset indent

.Pf \. Ns Sx \&Fn

.Pf . Sx \&Fn

.Op Ar functype

.Ar funcname

.Op Oo Ar argtype Oc Ar argname

Line 1768 is preferred for displaying code; the

Line 1763 is preferred for displaying code; the

.Sx \&Ic

macro is used when referring to specific instructions.

.Ss \&In

The name of an include file.

.Dq include

This macro is most often used in section 2, 3, and 9 manual pages.

file.

.Pp

When invoked as the first macro on an input line in the

.Em SYNOPSIS

section, the argument is displayed in angle brackets

and preceded by

.Dq #include ,

.Qq #include ,

and a blank line is inserted in front if there is a preceding

function declaration.

This is most often used in section 2, 3, and 9 manual pages.

In other sections, it only encloses its argument in angle brackets

and causes no line break.

.Pp

Examples:

.Dl \&.In sys/types.h

Line 1835 The

Line 1831 The

list is the most complicated.

Its syntax is as follows:

.Pp

.D1 Pf \. Sx \&It Ar cell Op <TAB> Ar cell ...

.D1 Pf \. Sx \&It Ar cell Op Sx \&Ta Ar cell ...

.D1 Pf \. Sx \&It Ar cell Op <TAB> Ar cell ...

.Pp

The arguments consist of one or more lines of text and macros

representing a complete table line.

Cells within the line are delimited by tabs or by the special

Cells within the line are delimited by the special

.Sx \&Ta

block macro.

block macro or by literal tab characters.

.Pp

Using literal tabs is strongly discouraged because they are very

hard to use correctly and

.Nm

code using them is very hard to read.

In particular, a blank character is syntactically significant

before and after the literal tab character.

If a word precedes or follows the tab without an intervening blank,

that word is never interpreted as a macro call, but always output

literally.

.Pp

The tab cell delimiter may only be used within the

.Sx \&It

line itself; on following lines, only the

Line 1857 Note that quoted strings may span tab-delimited cells

Line 1864 Note that quoted strings may span tab-delimited cells

line.

For example,

.Pp

.Dl .It \(dqcol1 ; <TAB> col2 ;\(dq \&;

.Dl .It \(dqcol1 ,\& <TAB> col2 ,\(dq \&;

.Pp

will preserve the semicolon whitespace except for the last.

will preserve the whitespace before both commas,

but not the whitespace before the semicolon.

.Pp

See also

.Sx \&Bl .

Line 1939 Examples:

Line 1947 Examples:

.Dl \&.An Kristaps Dzonsons \&Aq \&Mt kristaps@bsd.lv

.Ss \&Nd

A one line description of the manual's content.

This may only be invoked in the

This is the mandatory last macro of the

.Em SYNOPSIS

.Em NAME

section subsequent the

section and not appropriate for other sections.

.Sx \&Nm

macro.

.Pp

Examples:

.Dl Pf . Sx \&Nd mdoc language reference

Line 2100 Its syntax is as follows:

Line 2106 Its syntax is as follows:

The optional

.Ar system

parameter specifies the relevant operating system or environment.

Left unspecified, it defaults to the local operating system version.

It is suggested to leave it unspecified, in which case

This is the suggested form.

.Xr mandoc 1

uses its

.Fl Ios

argument or, if that isn't specified either,

.Fa sysname

and

.Fa release

as returned by

.Xr uname 3 .

.Pp

Examples:

.Dl \&.Os

Line 2158 See also

Line 2172 See also

Close parenthesised context opened by

.Sx \&Po .

.Ss \&Pf

Removes the space between its argument

Removes the space between its argument and the following macro.

.Pq Dq prefix

and the following macro.

Its syntax is as follows:

.Pp

.D1 .Pf Ar prefix macro arguments ...

.Pp

This is equivalent to:

.Pp

.D1 .No Ar prefix No \&Ns Ar macro arguments ...

.D1 .No \e& Ns Ar prefix No \&Ns Ar macro arguments ...

.Pp

The

.Ar prefix

argument is not parsed for macro names or delimiters,

but used verbatim as if it were escaped.

.Pp

Examples:

.Dl ".Pf $ Ar variable_name"

.Dl ".Pf . Ar macro_name"

.Dl ".Pf 0x Ar hex_digits"

.Pp

See also

Line 2205 See also

Line 2223 See also

Close quoted context opened by

.Sx \&Qo .

.Ss \&Ql

Format a single-quoted literal.

In-line literal display.

This can for example be used for complete command invocations and

for multi-word code fragments when more specific markup is not

appropriate and an indented display is not desired.

While

.Xr mandoc 1

always encloses the arguments in single quotes, other formatters

usually omit the quotes on non-terminal output devices when the

arguments have three or more characters.

.Pp

See also

.Sx \&Qq

.Sx \&Dl

and

.Sx \&Sq .

.Sx \&Bd

.Fl literal .

.Ss \&Qo

Multi-line version of

.Sx \&Qq .

Line 2260 Examples:

Line 2288 Examples:

\&.%A J. D. Ullman

\&.%B Introduction to Automata Theory, Languages, and Computation

\&.%I Addison-Wesley

\&.%C Reading, Massachusettes

\&.%C Reading, Massachusetts

\&.%D 1979

\&.Re

.Ed

Line 2698 Link to another manual

Line 2726 Link to another manual

.Pq Qq cross-reference .

Its syntax is as follows:

.Pp

.D1 Pf \. Sx \&Xr Ar name Op section

.D1 Pf \. Sx \&Xr Ar name section

.Pp

Cross reference the

.Ar name

and

.Ar section

number of another man page;

number of another man page.

omitting the section number is rarely useful.

.Pp

Examples:

.Dl \&.Xr mandoc 1

Line 3017 then the macro accepts an arbitrary number of argument

Line 3044 then the macro accepts an arbitrary number of argument

.It Sx \&Ux Ta Yes Ta Yes Ta n

.It Sx \&Va Ta Yes Ta Yes Ta n

.It Sx \&Vt Ta Yes Ta Yes Ta >0

.It Sx \&Xr Ta Yes Ta Yes Ta >0

.It Sx \&Xr Ta Yes Ta Yes Ta 2

.It Sx \&br Ta \&No Ta \&No Ta 0

.It Sx \&sp Ta \&No Ta \&No Ta 1

.El

Line 3037 For many macros, when the leading arguments are openin

Line 3064 For many macros, when the leading arguments are openin

these delimiters are put before the macro scope,

and when the trailing arguments are closing delimiters,

these delimiters are put after the macro scope.

Spacing is suppressed after opening delimiters

and before closing delimiters.

For example,

.Pp

.D1 Pf \. \&Aq "( [ word ] ) ."

Line 3093 renders as:

Line 3122 renders as:

.D1 Fl a ( b | c \*(Ba d ) e

.Pp

This applies to both opening and closing delimiters,

and also to the middle delimiter:

and also to the middle delimiter, which does not suppress spacing:

.Pp

.Bl -tag -width Ds -offset indent -compact

.It \&|

Line 3125 Manually switching the font using the

Line 3154 Manually switching the font using the

font escape sequences is never required.

.Sh COMPATIBILITY

This section provides an incomplete list of compatibility issues

between mandoc and other troff implementations, at this time limited

between mandoc and GNU troff

to GNU troff

.Pq Qq groff .

The term

.Qq historic groff

refers to groff versions before 1.17,

which featured a significant update of the

.Pa doc.tmac

file.

.Pp

Heirloom troff, the other significant troff implementation accepting

\-mdoc, is similar to historic groff.

.Pp

The following problematic behaviour is found in groff:

.ds hist (Historic groff only.)

.Pp

.Bl -dash -compact

.It

Display macros

.Po

.Sx \&Bd ,

.Sx \&Dl ,

and

.Sx \&D1

.Pc

may not be nested.

\*[hist]

.It

.Sx \&At

with unknown arguments produces no output at all.

\*[hist]

Newer groff and mandoc print

.Qq AT&T UNIX

and the arguments.

.It

.Sx \&Bl Fl column

does not recognise trailing punctuation characters when they immediately

precede tabulator characters, but treats them as normal text and

outputs a space before them.

.It

.Sx \&Bd Fl ragged compact

does not start a new line.

\*[hist]

.It

.Sx \&Dd

with non-standard arguments behaves very strangely.

When there are three arguments, they are printed verbatim.

Line 3177 but without any arguments the string

Line 3169 but without any arguments the string

.Dq Epoch

is printed.

.It

.Sx \&Fl

does not print a dash for an empty argument.

\*[hist]

.It

.Sx \&Fn

does not start a new line unless invoked as the line macro in the

.Em SYNOPSIS

section.

\*[hist]

.It

.Sx \&Fo

with

.Pf non- Sx \&Fa

children causes inconsistent spacing between arguments.

In mandoc, a single space is always inserted between arguments.

.It

.Sx \&Ft

in the

.Em SYNOPSIS

causes inconsistent vertical spacing, depending on whether a prior

.Sx \&Fn

has been invoked.

See

.Sx \&Ft

and

.Sx \&Fn

for the normalised behaviour in mandoc.

.It

.Sx \&In

ignores additional arguments and is not treated specially in the

.Em SYNOPSIS .

\*[hist]

.It

.Sx \&It

sometimes requires a

.Fl nested

flag.

\*[hist]

In new groff and mandoc, any list may be nested by default and

.Fl enum

lists will restart the sequence only for the sub-list.

.It

.Sx \&Li

followed by a delimiter is incorrectly used in some manuals

instead of properly quoting that character, which sometimes works with

historic groff.

.It

.Sx \&Lk

only accepts a single link-name argument; the remainder is misformatted.

.It

Line 3237 can only be called by other macros, but not at the beg

Line 3182 can only be called by other macros, but not at the beg

.Sx \&%C

is not implemented (up to and including groff-1.22.2).

.It

Historic groff only allows up to eight or nine arguments per macro input

line, depending on the exact situation.

Providing more arguments causes garbled output.

The number of arguments on one input line is not limited with mandoc.

.It

Historic groff has many un-callable macros.

Most of these (excluding some block-level macros) are callable

in new groff and mandoc.

.It

.Sq \(ba

(vertical bar) is not fully supported as a delimiter.

\*[hist]

.It

.Sq \ef

.Pq font face

and

Line 3267 The following features are unimplemented in mandoc:

Line 3199 The following features are unimplemented in mandoc:

.Bl -dash -compact

.It

.Sx \&Bd

.Fl file Ar file .

.Fl file Ar file

is unsupported for security reasons.

.It

.Sx \&Bd

.Fl filled

does not adjust the right margin, but is an alias for

.Sx \&Bd

.Fl ragged .

.It

.Sx \&Bd

.Fl literal

does not use a literal font, but is an alias for

.Sx \&Bd

.Fl unfilled .

.It

.Sx \&Bd

.Fl offset Cm center

and

.Fl offset Cm right .

.Fl offset Cm right

Groff does not implement centred and flush-right rendering either,

don't work.

Groff does not implement centered and flush-right rendering either,

but produces large indentations.

.El

.Sh SEE ALSO

Line 3284 but produces large indentations.

Line 3230 but produces large indentations.

.Xr mandoc_char 7 ,

.Xr roff 7 ,

.Xr tbl 7

.Pp

The web page

.Lk http://mdocml.bsd.lv/mdoc/ "extended documentation for the mdoc language"

provides a few tutorial-style pages for beginners, an extensive style

guide for advanced authors, and an alphabetic index helping to choose

the best macros for various kinds of content.

.Sh HISTORY

The

.Nm

CVSweb