Re: [Groff] Suggestion for images in groff/gpic, current state

[Werner LEMBERG]

> > > There is a \n[.w], I just forgot to mention it.
> >
> > Do you think we really need this?
> > 
> >   .nr xx \w'...'
> > 
> > was OK for at least 20 years :-)
> 
> That judgement is not for me to make. Joseph Ossanna saw the need
> for the .w register 26 years ago, and that is good enough for me.

Indeed!  CSTR54 lists \n[.w] in the table of registers, but it is not
documented further.  I looked into the source code of plan9's troff,
and I see that it simply contains the last character's width.  BUT: It
does *not* hold the width of \w.  Instead, it probably contains the
width of the last character in \w.

Can someone please post the results of the following:

  M
  .tm .w == \n[.w]
  i
  .tm .w == \n[.w]
  \w'a'
  .tm .w == \n[.w]
  \w'aa'
  .tm .w == \n[.w]

With `troff -Tps' I get

  .w == 8890
  .w == 2780
  .w == 5000
  .w == 5000

which means that `\w' apparently gets a generic width of 0.5em,
regardless of its contents.


    Werner