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Re: Zero Width Space
From: |
John Gardner |
Subject: |
Re: Zero Width Space |
Date: |
Mon, 6 Jun 2022 22:46:05 +1000 |
>
> What about "input escape"
Copy+pasta from my earlier post
<https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/groff/2022-06/msg00035.html> to a
concurrent discussion in another thread:
s/input escape/control suppressor/gi
s/input escape/command suppressor/gi
(This discussion appears to have been split between ˜3–4 other threads
<https://lists.gnu.org/archive/html/groff/2022-06/threads.html#00004>, so
I'm unsure which to reply to…)
On Mon, 6 Jun 2022 at 15:55, Ingo Schwarze <schwarze@usta.de> wrote:
> Hi,
>
> DJ Chase wrote on Sun, Jun 05, 2022 at 09:57:45PM +0000:
> > On Sun Jun 5, 2022 at 1:09 PM EDT, Ingo Schwarze wrote:
> >> Richard Morse wrote:
>
> >>> How about "non-breaking escape"
>
> >> That's much too broad since most escape sequences are non-breaking.
>
> >>> or "non-printing escape" (not necessarily in that order of preference)?
>
> >> That's also too broad for my taste; here are a few more escape
> >> sequences that are non-printing and non-breaking unless i'm
> >> missing something: \{ \} \F \f \H \k \M \m \R \S \s \z
> >> The difference between \& and the others is that \& is a no-op
> >> whereas the others all have some side effect.
>
> > What about "input escape",
>
> I wouldn't consider that helpful terminology.
> I would define the term "escape sequence" as "a sequence of
> input characters starting with the escape character, which is the
> backslash by default." Usually, every escape sequence is intended
> to directly or indirectly affect output, just like any other roff
> input including text lines, requests and macros. In that sense,
> every escape sequence is both an "input escape" and and "output
> escape": Input and output are merely two complimentary aspects of
> the behaviour of any escape sequence. Even using \& usually intends
> to influence output, for example suppress end-of-sentence spacing,
> kerning, or ligature building. So it is hardly more focussed on
> the input side than other escape sequences.
>
> > possibly with a comparing it to the intended
> > purpose of the ASCII escape character?
>
> I dislike that idea, too. When i consider terminal control codes
> or the use of the escape key in emacs(1) as examples, it seems
> to me that the ASCII escape character compares more readily to
> the roff(7) escape character (by default the backslash) than to
> a complete escape sequence like "\&". Even if you disregard that
> aspect, the \& escape sequence significantly differs from the
> ASCII escape character in two important aspects: it is often placed
> *after* the thing it is meant to escape rather than before, and
> while the ASCII escape character often gives special meaning to
> ordinary characters, \& does about the opposite: It takes away
> the special meaning that an input character (like '.') intrinsically
> has and turns it into an ordinary character, makes it behave like
> any other character that has no special meaning.
>
> Yours,
> Ingo
>
>
- Re: Zero Width Space (was Re: How to print a literal '.' as the first character in a line?), (continued)
- Re: Zero Width Space (was Re: How to print a literal '.' as the first character in a line?), Dave Kemper, 2022/06/05
- Re: Zero-Width Space., Ralph Corderoy, 2022/06/05
- Re: Zero Width Space (was Re: How to print a literal '.' as the first character in a line?), Richard Morse, 2022/06/05
- Re: Zero Width Space, Ingo Schwarze, 2022/06/05
- Re: Zero Width Space, Ralph Corderoy, 2022/06/05
- Re: Zero Width Space, Alejandro Colomar, 2022/06/05
- Re: Zero Width Space, Alejandro Colomar, 2022/06/05
- Re: Zero Width Space, Ingo Schwarze, 2022/06/05
- Re: Zero Width Space, DJ Chase, 2022/06/05
- Re: Zero Width Space, Ingo Schwarze, 2022/06/06
- Re: Zero Width Space,
John Gardner <=
- groff man(7) `B` macro behavior with `\c`, and input traps, G. Branden Robinson, 2022/06/05
- Re: groff man(7) `B` macro behavior with `\c`, and input traps, Ingo Schwarze, 2022/06/06
- Re: groff man(7) `B` macro behavior with `\c`, and input traps, John Gardner, 2022/06/06
- Re: groff man(7) `B` macro behavior with `\c`, and input traps, G. Branden Robinson, 2022/06/10
- Re: groff man(7) `B` macro behavior with `\c`, and input traps, Ralph Corderoy, 2022/06/10
- Re: groff man(7) `B` macro behavior with `\c`, and input traps, G. Branden Robinson, 2022/06/06
- Re: groff man(7) `B` macro behavior with `\c`, and input traps, G. Branden Robinson, 2022/06/07
- Re: groff man(7) `B` macro behavior with `\c`, and input traps, G. Branden Robinson, 2022/06/10
- Re: groff man(7) `B` macro behavior with `\c`, and input traps, Ingo Schwarze, 2022/06/17
- Re: groff man(7) `B` macro behavior with `\c`, and input traps, G. Branden Robinson, 2022/06/18