[Groff] Double-column footnotes

[Robert D. Goulding]

Dear trofflodytes (I like it!),

I now have the paragraph-style footnotes working pretty robustly,
including over page transitions.  The next thing I want to implement is
normal, but double-column footnotes.  These will be like ordinary
footnotes, with a reference in the text and a reference in the footnote
text, with a new line for each footnote.  But the footnotes should be in
two balanced columns, like this:

Blah blah blah blah.1  Blah blah, blah blah blah blah blah.  Blah blah
blah: blah blah.2  Blah blah blah.

----------

1. Blah blah  blah blah         blah, blah blah.  Blah
blah, blah  blah  blah.         blah  blah, blah (blah
2. Blah blah, blah blah         blah, blah blah).

One way I thought of doing it: collect the footnote text in a diversion,
with a short line length.  The page-bottom trap should be moved so that
half the height of the diversion can fit on the page - then output the two
halves of the diversion next to each other.  But is this even
theoretically possible?  Or is there some other way to do it, and has
anyone implemented it?  (It's mentioned in a comment in, I think, m.tmac,
as a possible future feature).

Robert.

-- 
Robert Goulding
Society of Fellows
Joseph Henry House
Princeton NJ 08544