Re: [Groff] How to switch off line filling?

[Keith Marshall]

On Monday 21 January 2008 21:17, Dan H wrote:
> > With respect, I beg to differ; ms has very capable support for
> > lists, (bulleted, numbered or glossary), nested to *any* arbitrary
> > level.
>
> yeah, I've found out how ms does the list thing. I agree that it is
> capable of creating good-looking lists but I like auto-numbering and
> such.

Auto-numbering is trivial -- just use an auto-incrementing number 
register within the `marker' argument to .IP; (for nested lists, use a 
distinct register for each level of inner list, and reinitialise each 
to one, on each occasion of entry to its level).

> But since I'm beginning to like groff good enough to write some 
> simple preprocessor for my own needs (something that creates /italics/
> and *bold* and stuff)

ms *already* does italics and bold, and stuff!  Check out the .I, .B 
and .R macros, (and their hybrid .BR, .IR, .BI, etc. derivatives).  
And, you can also use the standard troff escapes.

> I might as well add some list support code, and then it doesn't matter
> which tmac package I use.

Well, writing a fully featured macro package is far from a trivial task.
Don't let me discourage you, but be prepared for a lot of work ahead.  
Most of us, who use ms, treat it as a core resource, and augment it 
with our own additional macros -- an example might be wrapping .IP in a 
higher level macro, to automate the initialisation of number regisrers 
for nested numbered lists.

Regards,
Keith.