Re: [Groff] Marginal Annotations

[P. Alejandro Lopez-Valencia]

At 01:49 p.m. 07/05/2002 -0400, Robert D. Goulding wrote:

> The marginal macros are exactly as I found them in this group (see
> http://www.ffii.org/archive/mails/groff/2000/Jul/0041.html). Could the
> missing definition explain the unwanted vertical space?  How would I fix
> this?
>
> (Sorry if this appears in a separate thread; still figuring out how to use
> the mailing list.)


Oopsie! I read the macro too fast, and too early in the morning. Let me 
take another shot at this.

margin-di is a diversion and is there, disregard what I said this morning. 
Let's take a look at the code:

.ev margin-ev    \" define new environment called margin-ev
.    ps 8        \" set font point size to 8pt
.    vs 9        \" set vertical size to 9v (line height)
.    ft R        \" set roman face ("plain" face)
.ev              \" reset environment to previous
.
.
.de MS \" define new macro MS creating a margin par environment
.    ev margin-ev \" set local environemtn margin-ev
.    di margin-di \" create diversion margin-di (save parameters)
.    sp .25 \" vertical space up (positive sign)
.    po .4i \" set page offset
.    ll .6i \" set line length
..   \" end macro
.
.
.de ME     \" define macro to end diversion and environment
.    br    \" line break
.    di    \" end current diversion
.    ie (\\n[dn]+\\n[nl])>=(\\n[.p]-\\n[FM]) \{\
.    \" Start conditional.
.    \" if height of last completed diversion plus the length
.    \" of last completed diversion is greater or equal to
.    \" the current page length minus the footer margin height
.    \" at the bottom of the page (FM is an ms public register)
.    \" then
.    tm Margin message is too big at line \\n[.c]
.    \"  print to the terminal [...] current input line number
.    \} \" close conditional
.    el \{\       \" open else clause
.    margin-di    \" set diversion values
.    sp -\\n[dn]u \" set space to the negative value of
.                 \" height of last completed diversion
.                 \" in device units
.    \}           \" close conditional
.    po           \" reset page offset to original
.    ll           \" ibid line length
.    ev           \" ibid environment
..                \" end macro

Phew! Now that we know what is going on in there, what I think you need to 
do is tweaking the vertical spacing in .MS (.sp) and the vertical size in 
the margin environment until you get the vertical alignment the way you 
want...

Unfortunately aligning baselines at different scaled sizes depends entirely 
on the actual typeface design and variation you use. I think you'd have 
better luck with this kind of alignment if you placed the text in a box and 
then aligned the box to the main text. (No, I am not volunteering, not that 
skilled at it yet. Check groff(7)).

Cheers