Re: [Groff] extended font macro

[Werner LEMBERG]

>> > .FONT I text1 R text2 I text3 R text4
>> > is equivalent to .IR text1 text2 text3 text4
>> 
>> I don't particularly like the idea; changing the font for
>> individual strings is very low level manipulation.  Groff does have
>> established syntax for that, namely \fItext1 \fRtext2 \fItext3
>> \fRtext4.  Arguably, that's not particularly nice syntax, but it is
>> how roff syntax looks like: this century is not the right time to
>> change basic roff syntax.

I disagree.  Bernd is aiming at improving the man syntax, moving away
from low-level groff.  Basically, this is a good idea.

> I gave just an extension.  Maybe there are other people who want to
> be more modern.  You can use the extension just by integrating the
> macro definition.  So no one is hurt.

Unfortunately, this is not true.  If you want to write portable man
pages used on many different systems, you must provide code which is
parseable everywhere.  As Ingo says, some systems no longer use groff
but various scripts which understand man macros and nothing else.  If
you introduce a new macro, chances are high that those other programs
are no longer be able to parse the new man page correctly.

>> What man(7) still *is* useful for is backward-compatibility with
>> archaic systems that still lack mdoc(7) - like Solaris.  By
>> extending man(7) functionality, you would destroy that last asset
>> man(7) has.

This is not correct.  an-ext.mdoc is written in a way that makes it
work on non-groff troff also.

> I propose to change the tmac file, that's freedom.  No one is hurt
> by that, but man-pages will become easier.

What you write would be true for any macro package *except* man and
mdoc...

A generic .FT command added to man would be very useful, and scripts
which parse man pages could be easily adjusted.  Alas, I think that
the disadvantages outweigh the benefits.


    Werner