Re: backslashes

[Lar Kaufman]

> To get one backslash: "\\" (see the user manual, section 2.1).

One of the troubling problems with troff is the inability
to *ever* explicitly specify the backslash character for
output.  Each level of processing strips an escape
character, so every time one assembles and embeds macros,
one has to rebuffer the intended backslash output
character.  (\e does not specify the backslash; it
specifies the escape character, which can be changed from
the default backslash.)  I like a syntax such as the "tr" 
command supports, which allows you to to specify any ASCII
character by octal code.  I suppose that this could be
improved upon by specifying an ISO character set and then
the position of the character in the set... 

-lar  (not yet a lout user)

Lar Kaufman, Documentation Tools Specialist    email:  address@hidden
O'Reilly and Associates, Inc.                  voice:  617-354-5800
90 Sherman Street                          facsimile:  617-661-1116
Cambridge, MA 01240 USA          personal email: address@hidden