[bug #63142] [troff]: deprecate newlines as escape argument delimeters

[G. Branden Robinson]

URL:
  <https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?63142>

                 Summary: [troff]: deprecate newlines as escape argument
delimeters
                 Project: GNU troff
               Submitter: gbranden
               Submitted: Fri 30 Sep 2022 11:33:47 PM UTC
                Category: Core
                Severity: 1 - Wish
              Item Group: Feature change
                  Status: Need Info
                 Privacy: Public
             Assigned to: None
             Open/Closed: Open
         Discussion Lock: Any
         Planned Release: None


    _______________________________________________________

Follow-up Comments:


-------------------------------------------------------
Date: Fri 30 Sep 2022 11:33:47 PM UTC By: G. Branden Robinson <gbranden>
I recently had to research this issue to revise the corresponding section of
our Texinfo manual.

https://git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/groff.git/tree/doc/groff.texi?id=f86b47890a6759bbef94216bf6f9cd7fe337cfe3#n6935

I've taken time to look at Heirloom Doctools troff and its ancestor DWB 3.3
troff, and I found out to my surprise that this support for newlines as escape
delimiters does _not_ appear to be a backward-compatibility provision.

This feature was undocumented in our man pages, _incorrectly_ documented in
our Texinfo manual for 20 years, and was associated with the spurious emission
of a warning when attempted (bug #63011).

I therefore propose to emit a deprecation diagnostic for this case and remove
it from a future (post-1.23) groff release.

I'll return with exhibits of groff, Heirloom, and DWB behavior from their
respective Git HEADs...but first I found a bug in our handling of \Z, so I'm
going to chase that down first.







    _______________________________________________________

Reply to this item at:

  <https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?63142>

_______________________________________________
Message sent via Savannah
https://savannah.gnu.org/