other languages
MDOC.SAMPLES(7) | Miscellaneous Information Manual | MDOC.SAMPLES(7) |
NAME¶
mdoc.samples — tutorial sampler for writing BSD manuals with -mdocSYNOPSIS¶
man mdoc.samples |
DESCRIPTION¶
A tutorial sampler for writing BSD manual pages with the -mdoc macro package, a content-based and domain-based formatting package for troff(1). Its predecessor, the -man(7) package, addressed page layout leaving the manipulation of fonts and other typesetting details to the individual author. In -mdoc, page layout macros make up the page structure domain which consists of macros for titles, section headers, displays and lists. Essentially items which affect the physical position of text on a formatted page. In addition to the page structure domain, there are two more domains, the manual domain and the general text domain. The general text domain is defined as macros which perform tasks such as quoting or emphasizing pieces of text. The manual domain is defined as macros that are a subset of the day to day informal language used to describe commands, routines and related BSD files. Macros in the manual domain handle command names, command line arguments and options, function names, function parameters, pathnames, variables, cross references to other manual pages, and so on. These domain items have value for both the author and the future user of the manual page. It is hoped the consistency gained across the manual set will provide easier translation to future documentation tools. Throughout the UNIX manual pages, a manual entry is simply referred to as a man page, regardless of actual length and without sexist intention.GETTING STARTED¶
Since a tutorial document is normally read when a person desires to use the material immediately, the assumption has been made that the user of this document may be impatient. The material presented in the remained of this document is outlined as follows:- TROFF IDIOSYNCRASIES
- Macro Usage.
- Passing Space Characters in an Argument.
- Trailing Blank Space Characters (a warning).
- Escaping Special Characters.
- THE ANATOMY OF A MAN PAGE
- A manual page template.
- TITLE MACROS.
- INTRODUCTION OF MANUAL AND GENERAL TEXT DOMAINS.
- What's in a name....
- General Syntax.
- MANUAL DOMAIN
- Addresses.
- Author name.
- Arguments.
- Configuration Declarations (section four only).
- Command Modifier.
- Defined Variables.
- Errno's (Section two only).
- Environment Variables.
- Function Argument.
- Function Declaration.
- Flags.
- Functions (library routines).
- Function Types.
- Interactive Commands.
- Names.
- Options.
- Pathnames.
- Variables.
- Cross References.
- GENERAL TEXT DOMAIN
- AT&T Macro.
- BSD Macro.
- FreeBSD Macro.
- UNIX Macro.
- Enclosure/Quoting Macros
-
- Angle Bracket Quote/Enclosure.
- Bracket Quotes/Enclosure.
- Double Quote macro/Enclosure.
- Parenthesis Quote/Enclosure.
- Single Quotes/Enclosure.
- Prefix Macro.
- No-Op or Normal Text Macro.
- No Space Macro.
- Section Cross References.
- References and Citations.
- Return Values (sections two and three only)
- Trade Names (Acronyms and Type Names).
- Extended Arguments.
- PAGE STRUCTURE DOMAIN
- Section Headers.
- Paragraphs and Line Spacing.
- Keeps.
- Displays.
- Font Modes (Emphasis, Literal, and Symbolic).
- Lists and Columns.
- PREDEFINED STRINGS
- DIAGNOSTICS
- FORMATTING WITH GROFF, TROFF AND NROFF
- BUGS
TROFF IDIOSYNCRASIES¶
The -mdoc package attempts to simplify the process of writing a man page. Theoretically, one should not have to learn the dirty details of troff(1) to use -mdoc; however, there are a few limitations which are unavoidable and best gotten out of the way. And, too, be forewarned, this package is not fast.Macro Usage¶
As in troff(1), a macro is called by placing a ‘.
’ (dot character) at the beginning of a
line followed by the two character name for the macro. Arguments may follow
the macro separated by spaces. It is the dot character at the beginning of the
line which causes troff(1) to interpret the next two
characters as a macro name. To place a ‘.
’
(dot character) at the beginning of a line in some context other than a macro
invocation, precede the ‘.
’ (dot) with the
‘\&
’ escape sequence. The
‘\&
’ translates literally to a zero
width space, and is never displayed in the output.
In general, troff(1) macros accept up to nine arguments, any
extra arguments are ignored. Most macros in -mdoc accept
nine arguments and, in limited cases, arguments may be continued or extended
on the next line (See Extensions). A few
macros handle quoted arguments (see
Passing Space
Characters in an Argument below).
Most of the -mdoc general text domain and manual domain macros
are special in that their argument lists are parsed for
callable macro names. This means an argument on the argument list which
matches a general text or manual domain macro name and is determined to be
callable will be executed or called when it is processed. In this case the
argument, although the name of a macro, is not preceded by a
‘.
’ (dot). It is in this manner that many
macros are nested; for example the option macro,
‘.Op
’, may call the flag
and argument macros, ‘Fl
’ and
‘Ar
’, to specify an optional flag with an
argument:
- [-s bytes]
- is produced by
.Op Fl s Ar bytes
\&
’:
- [Fl s Ar bytes]
- is produced by
.Op \&Fl s \&Ar bytes
Fl
’ and
‘Ar
’ are not interpreted as macros. Macros
whose argument lists are parsed for callable arguments are referred to as
parsed and macros which may be called from an argument list are referred to as
callable throughout this document and in the companion quick reference manual
mdoc(7). This is a technical faux pas as
almost all of the macros in -mdoc are parsed, but as it was
cumbersome to constantly refer to macros as being callable and being able to
call other macros, the term parsed has been used.
Passing Space Characters in an Argument¶
Sometimes it is desirable to give as one argument a string containing one or more blank space characters. This may be necessary to defeat the nine argument limit or to specify arguments to macros which expect particular arrangement of items in the argument list. For example, the function macro ‘.Fn
’ expects the first argument to be the
name of a function and any remaining arguments to be function parameters. As
ANSI C stipulates the declaration of function parameters in the parenthesized
parameter list, each parameter is guaranteed to be at minimum a two word
string. For example, int foo.
There are two possible ways to pass an argument which contains an embedded
space. Implementation note: Unfortunately, the most
convenient way of passing spaces in between quotes by reassigning individual
arguments before parsing was fairly expensive speed wise and space wise to
implement in all the macros for AT&T troff. It is not
expensive for groff but for the sake of portability, has
been limited to the following macros which need it the most:
Cd
- Configuration declaration (section 4 SYNOPSIS)
Bl
- Begin list (for the width specifier).
Em
- Emphasized text.
Fn
- Functions (sections two and four).
It
- List items.
Li
- Literal text.
Sy
- Symbolic text.
%B
- Book titles.
%J
- Journal names.
%O
- Optional notes for a reference.
%R
- Report title (in a reference).
%T
- Title of article in a book or journal.
\
’, that
is, a blank space preceded by the escape character
‘\
’. This method may be used with any
macro but has the side effect of interfering with the adjustment of text over
the length of a line. Troff sees the hard space as if it
were any other printable character and cannot split the string into blank or
newline separated pieces as one would expect. The method is useful for strings
which are not expected to overlap a line boundary. For example:
- fetch(char *str)
- is created by ‘
.Fn fetch char\ *str
’ - fetch(char *str)
- can also be created by ‘
.Fn fetch \*qchar *str\*q
’
\
’ or quotes were omitted,
‘.Fn
’ would see three arguments and the
result would be:
fetch(char,
*str)
Trailing Blank Space Characters¶
Troff can be confused by blank space characters at the end of a line. It is a wise preventive measure to globally remove all blank spaces from <blank-space><end-of-line> character sequences. Should the need arise to force a blank character at the end of a line, it may be forced with an unpaddable space and the ‘\&
’
escape character. For example,
‘string\ \&
’.
Escaping Special Characters¶
Special characters like the newline character ‘\n
’, are handled by replacing the
‘\
’ with
‘\e
’ (e.g.
‘\en
’) to preserve the backslash.
THE ANATOMY OF A MAN PAGE¶
The body of a man page is easily constructed from a basic template found in the file /usr/share/misc/mdoc.template. Several example man pages can also be found in /usr/share/examples/mdoc.A manual page template¶
.\" The following requests are required for all man pages. .Dd Month day, year .Os OPERATING_SYSTEM [version/release] .Dt DOCUMENT_TITLE [section number] [volume] .Sh NAME .Nm name .Nd one line description of name .Sh SYNOPSIS .Sh DESCRIPTION .\" The following requests should be uncommented and .\" used where appropriate. This next request is .\" for sections 2 and 3 function return values only. .\" .Sh RETURN VALUES .\" This next request is for sections 1, 6, 7 & 8 only .\" .Sh ENVIRONMENT .\" .Sh FILES .\" .Sh EXAMPLES .\" This next request is for sections 1, 6, 7 & 8 only .\" (command return values (to shell) and .\" fprintf/stderr type diagnostics) .\" .Sh DIAGNOSTICS .\" The next request is for sections 2 and 3 error .\" and signal handling only. .\" .Sh ERRORS .\" .Sh SEE ALSO .\" .Sh STANDARDS .\" .Sh HISTORY .\" .Sh AUTHORS .\" .Sh BUGS
.Dd
,
.Os
, .Dt
); the document date,
the operating system the man page or subject source is developed or modified
for, and the man page title (in upper case) along with the
section of the manual the page belongs in. These macros identify the page, and
are discussed below in TITLE MACROS.
The remaining items in the template are section headers
(.Sh
); of which NAME,
SYNOPSIS and
DESCRIPTION are mandatory. The headers
are discussed in PAGE STRUCTURE
DOMAIN, after presentation of MANUAL
DOMAIN. Several content macros are used to demonstrate page layout macros;
reading about content macros before page layout macros is recommended.
TITLE MACROS¶
The title macros are the first portion of the page structure domain, but are presented first and separate for someone who wishes to start writing a man page yesterday. Three header macros designate the document title or manual page title, the operating system, and the date of authorship. These macros are one called once at the very beginning of the document and are used to construct the headers and footers only..Dt DOCUMENT_TITLE section# [volume]
- The document title is the subject of the man page and must
be in CAPITALS due to troff limitations. The section number may be
1, ..., 8, and if it is specified, the volume title may be
omitted. A volume title may be arbitrary or one of the following:
AMD
UNIX Ancestral Manual Documents SMM
UNIX System Manager's Manual URM
UNIX Reference Manual PRM
UNIX Programmer's Manual URM
for sections 1, 6, and 7;SMM
for section 8;PRM
for sections 2, 3, 4, and 5. .Os operating_system release#
- The name of the operating system should be the common
acronym, e.g. BSD or FreeBSD or ATT. The release should be the standard
release nomenclature for the system specified, e.g. 4.3, 4.3+Tahoe, V.3,
V.4. Unrecognized arguments are displayed as given in the page footer. For
instance, a typical footer might be:
or
.Os BSD 4.3
or for a locally produced set.Os FreeBSD 2.2
The Berkeley default, ‘.Os CS Department
.Os
’ without an argument, has been defined as BSD in the site specific file /usr/share/tmac/mdoc/doc-common. It really should default to LOCAL. Note, if the ‘.Os
’ macro is not present, the bottom left corner of the page will be ugly. .Dd month day, year
- The date should be written formally:
January 25, 1989
INTRODUCTION OF MANUAL AND GENERAL TEXT DOMAINS¶
What's in a name...¶
The manual domain macro names are derived from the day to day informal language used to describe commands, subroutines and related files. Slightly different variations of this language are used to describe the three different aspects of writing a man page. First, there is the description of -mdoc macro request usage. Second is the description of a UNIX command with -mdoc macros and third, the description of a command to a user in the verbal sense; that is, discussion of a command in the text of a man page. In the first case, troff(1) macros are themselves a type of command; the general syntax for a troff command is:.Va argument1 argument2 ...
argument9
The ‘.Va
’ is a macro command or request, and
anything following it is an argument to be processed. In the second case, the
description of a UNIX command using the content macros
is a bit more involved; a typical SYNOPSIS
command line might be displayed as:
filter
[-flag] infile
outfile
Here, filter is the command name and the bracketed string
-flag is a flag argument designated as
optional by the option brackets. In -mdoc terms,
infile and outfile are called
arguments. The macros which formatted the above example:
.Nm filter .Op Fl flag .Ar infile outfile
- make
- [-eiknqrstv] [-D variable] [-d flags] [-f makefile] [-I directory] [-j max_jobs] [variable=value] [target ...]
Ar
’ argument macro is used for an operand
or file argument like target as well as an argument to a
flag like variable. The make command line was produced
from:
.Nm make .Op Fl eiknqrstv .Op Fl D Ar variable .Op Fl d Ar flags .Op Fl f Ar makefile .Op Fl I Ar directory .Op Fl j Ar max_jobs .Op Ar variable=value .Bk -words .Op Ar target ... .Ek
.Bk
’ and
‘.Ek
’ macros are explained in
Keeps.
General Syntax¶
The manual domain and general text domain macros share a similar syntax with a few minor deviations: ‘.Ar
’,
‘.Fl
’,
‘.Nm
’, and
‘.Pa
’ differ only when called without
arguments; ‘.Fn
’ and
‘.Xr
’ impose an order on their argument
lists and the ‘.Op
’ and
‘.Fn
’ macros have nesting limitations. All
content macros are capable of recognizing and properly handling punctuation,
provided each punctuation character is separated by a leading space. If an
request is given:
.Li sptr, ptr),
sptr,
ptr),
.Li sptr , ptr ) ,
sptr
,
ptr
),
\&
’. Troff is
limited as a macro language, and has difficulty when presented with a string
containing a member of the mathematical, logical or quotation set:
{+,-,/,*,%,<,>,<=,>=,=,==,&,`,',"}
\&
’. Typical syntax is shown in the
first content macro displayed below,
‘.Ad
’.
MANUAL DOMAIN¶
Address Macro¶
The address macro identifies an address construct of the form addr1[,addr2[,addr3]].Usage: .Ad address ...
.Ad addr1
- addr1
.Ad addr1 .
- addr1.
.Ad addr1 , file2
- addr1, file2
.Ad f1 , f2 , f3 :
- f1, f2, f3:
.Ad addr ) ) ,
- addr)),
.Ad
’ without
arguments. ‘.Ad
’ is callable by other
macros and is parsed.
Author Name¶
The ‘.An
’ macro is used to specify the name
of the author of the item being documented, or the name of the author of the
actual manual page. Any remaining arguments after the name information are
assumed to be punctuation.
Usage: .An author_name
.An Joe Author
- Joe Author
.An Joe Author ,
- Joe Author,
.An Joe Author Aq nobody@FreeBSD.ORG
- Joe Author ⟨nobody@FreeBSD.ORG⟩
.An Joe Author ) ) ,
- Joe Author)),
.An
’ macro is parsed and is callable.
It is an error to call ‘.An
’ without any
arguments.
Argument Macro¶
The ‘.Ar
’ argument macro may be used
whenever a command line argument is referenced.
Usage: .Ar argument ...
.Ar
- file ...
.Ar file1
- file1
.Ar file1 .
- file1.
.Ar file1 file2
- file1 file2
.Ar f1 f2 f3 :
- f1 f2 f3:
.Ar file ) ) ,
- file)),
.Ar
’ is called without arguments
‘file ...
’ is
assumed. The ‘.Ar
’ macro is parsed and is
callable.
Configuration Declaration (section four only)¶
The ‘.Cd
’ macro is used to demonstrate a
config(8) declaration for a device interface in a section
four manual. This macro accepts quoted arguments (double quotes only).
- device le0 at scode?
- produced by: ‘
.Cd device le0 at scode?
’.
Command Modifier¶
The command modifier is identical to the ‘.Fl
’ (flag) command with the exception
the ‘.Cm
’ macro does not assert a dash in
front of every argument. Traditionally flags are marked by the preceding dash,
some commands or subsets of commands do not use them. Command modifiers may
also be specified in conjunction with interactive commands such as editor
commands. See Flags.
Defined Variables¶
A variable which is defined in an include file is specified by the macro ‘.Dv
’.
Usage: .Dv defined_variable ...
.Dv MAXHOSTNAMELEN
MAXHOSTNAMELEN
.Dv TIOCGPGRP )
TIOCGPGRP
)
.Dv
’ without
arguments. ‘.Dv
’ is parsed and is
callable.
Errno's (Section two only)¶
The ‘.Er
’ errno macro specifies the error
return value for section two library routines. The second example below shows
‘.Er
’ used with the
‘.Bq
’ general text domain macro, as it
would be used in a section two manual page.
Usage: .Er ERRNOTYPE ...
.Er ENOENT
ENOENT
.Er ENOENT ) ;
ENOENT
);.Bq Er ENOTDIR
- [
ENOTDIR
]
.Er
’ without
arguments. The ‘.Er
’ macro is parsed and
is callable.
Environment Variables¶
The ‘.Ev
’ macro specifies an environment
variable.
Usage: .Ev argument ...
.Ev DISPLAY
DISPLAY
.Ev PATH .
PATH
..Ev PRINTER ) ) ,
PRINTER
)),
.Ev
’ without
arguments. The ‘.Ev
’ macro is parsed and
is callable.
Function Argument¶
The ‘.Fa
’ macro is used to refer to function
arguments (parameters) outside of the
SYNOPSIS section of the manual or inside
the SYNOPSIS section should a parameter
list be too long for the ‘.Fn
’ macro and
the enclosure macros ‘.Fo
’ and
‘.Fc
’ must be used.
‘.Fa
’ may also be used to refer to
structure members.
Usage: .Fa function_argument ...
.Fa d_namlen ) ) ,
- d_namlen)),
.Fa iov_len
- iov_len
.Fa
’ without
arguments. ‘.Fa
’ is parsed and is
callable.
Function Declaration¶
The ‘.Fd
’ macro is used in the
SYNOPSIS section with section two or three
functions. The ‘.Fd
’ macro does not call
other macros and is not callable by other macros.
Usage: .Fd include_file (or defined
variable)
.Fd
’ request causes a line break if a
function has already been presented and a break has not occurred. This leaves
a nice vertical space in between the previous function call and the
declaration for the next function.
Flags¶
The ‘.Fl
’ macro handles command line flags.
It prepends a dash, ‘-
’, to the flag. For
interactive command flags, which are not prepended with a dash, the
‘.Cm
’ (command modifier) macro is
identical, but without the dash.
Usage: .Fl argument ...
.Fl
- -
.Fl cfv
- -cfv
.Fl cfv .
- -cfv.
.Fl s v t
- -s -v -t
.Fl - ,
- --,
.Fl xyz ) ,
- -xyz),
.Fl
’ macro without any arguments
results in a dash representing stdin/stdout. Note that giving
‘.Fl
’ a single dash, will result in two
dashes. The ‘.Fl
’ macro is parsed and is
callable.
Functions (library routines)¶
The .Fn macro is modeled on ANSI C conventions.Usage: .Fn [type] function [[type] parameters ... ]
.Fn getchar
- getchar()
.Fn strlen ) ,
- strlen()),
.Fn \*qint align\*q \*qconst * char *sptrs\*q
,- int align(const * char *sptrs),
.Fn
’ without any
arguments. The ‘.Fn
’ macro is parsed and
is callable, note that any call to another macro signals the end of the
‘.Fn
’ call (it will close-parenthesis at
that point).
For functions that have more than eight parameters (and this is rare), the
macros ‘.Fo
’ (function open) and
‘.Fc
’ (function close) may be used with
‘.Fa
’ (function argument) to get around
the limitation. For example:
.Fo "int res_mkquery" .Fa "int op" .Fa "char *dname" .Fa "int class" .Fa "int type" .Fa "char *data" .Fa "int datalen" .Fa "struct rrec *newrr" .Fa "char *buf" .Fa "int buflen" .Fc
int
res_mkquery(int op, char
*dname, int class, int type,
char *data, int datalen,
struct rrec *newrr, char *buf,
int buflen);
The ‘.Fo
’ and
‘.Fc
’ macros are parsed and are callable.
In the SYNOPSIS section, the function will
always begin at the beginning of line. If there is more than one function
presented in the SYNOPSIS section and a
function type has not been given, a line break will occur, leaving a nice
vertical space between the current function name and the one prior. At the
moment, ‘.Fn
’ does not check its word
boundaries against troff line lengths and may split across a newline
ungracefully. This will be fixed in the near future.
Function Type¶
This macro is intended for the SYNOPSIS section. It may be used anywhere else in the man page without problems, but its main purpose is to present the function type in kernel normal form for the SYNOPSIS of sections two and three (it causes a line break allowing the function name to appear on the next line).Usage: .Ft type ...
.Ft struct stat
- struct stat
.Ft
’ request is not callable by other
macros.
Interactive Commands¶
The ‘.Ic
’ macro designates an interactive or
internal command.
Usage: .Ic argument ...
.Ic :wq
- :wq
.Ic do while {...}
- do while {...}
.Ic setenv , unsetenv
- setenv, unsetenv
.Ic
’ without
arguments. The ‘.Ic
’ macro is parsed and
is callable.
Name Macro¶
The ‘.Nm
’ macro is used for the document
title or subject name. It has the peculiarity of remembering the first
argument it was called with, which should always be the subject name of the
page. When called without arguments, ‘.Nm
’
regurgitates this initial name for the sole purpose of making less work for
the author. Note: a section two or three document function name is addressed
with the ‘.Nm
’ in the
NAME section, and with
‘.Fn
’ in the
SYNOPSIS and remaining sections. For
interactive commands, such as the ‘while
’
command keyword in csh(1), the
‘.Ic
’ macro should be used. While the
‘.Ic
’ is nearly identical to
‘.Nm
’, it can not recall the first
argument it was invoked with.
Usage: .Nm argument ...
.Nm mdoc.sample
- mdoc.sample
.Nm \-mdoc
- -mdoc.
.Nm foo ) ) ,
- foo)),
.Nm
- mdoc.samples
.Nm
’ macro is parsed and is callable.
Options¶
The ‘.Op
’ macro places option brackets
around the any remaining arguments on the command line, and places any
trailing punctuation outside the brackets. The macros
‘.Oc
’ and
‘.Oo
’ may be used across one or more
lines.
Usage: .Op options ...
.Op
- []
.Op Fl k
- [-k]
.Op Fl k ) .
- [-k]).
.Op Fl k Ar kookfile
- [-k kookfile]
.Op Fl k Ar kookfile ,
- [-k kookfile],
.Op Ar objfil Op Ar corfil
- [objfil [corfil]]
.Op Fl c Ar objfil Op Ar corfil ,
- [-c objfil [corfil]],
.Op word1 word2
- [word1 word2]
.Oc
’ and
‘.Oo
’ macros:
.Oo .Op Fl k Ar kilobytes .Op Fl i Ar interval .Op Fl c Ar count .Oc
.Op
’,
‘.Oc
’ and
‘.Oo
’ are parsed and are callable.
Pathnames¶
The ‘.Pa
’ macro formats path or file names.
Usage: .Pa pathname
.Pa /usr/share
- /usr/share
.Pa /tmp/fooXXXXX ) .
- /tmp/fooXXXXX).
.Pa
’ macro is parsed and is callable.
Variables¶
Generic variable reference:Usage: .Va variable ...
.Va count
- count
.Va settimer
,- settimer,
.Va int *prt ) :
- int *prt):
.Va char s ] ) ) ,
- char s])),
.Va
’ without any
arguments. The ‘.Va
’ macro is parsed and
is callable.
Manual Page Cross References¶
The ‘.Xr
’ macro expects the first argument
to be a manual page name, and the second argument, if it exists, to be either
a section page number or punctuation. Any remaining arguments are assumed to
be punctuation.
Usage: .Xr man_page [1,...,8]
.Xr
’ macro is parsed and is callable.
It is an error to call ‘.Xr
’ without any
arguments.
GENERAL TEXT DOMAIN¶
AT&T Macro¶
Usage: .At [v6 | v7 | 32v | V.1 | V.4] ...
.At
- AT&T UNIX
.At v6 .
- Version 6 AT&T UNIX.
.At
’ macro is not
parsed and not callable. It accepts at most two arguments.
BSD Macro¶
Usage: .Bx [Version/release] ...
.Bx
- BSD
.Bx 4.3 .
- 4.3BSD.
.Bx
’ macro is parsed and is callable.
FreeBSD Macro¶
Usage: .Fx Version.release ...
.Fx 2.2 .
- FreeBSD 2.2.
.Fx
’ macro is not
parsed and not callable. It accepts at most two arguments.
UNIX Macro¶
Usage: .Ux ...
.Ux
- UNIX
.Ux
’ macro is parsed and is callable.
Enclosure and Quoting Macros¶
The concept of enclosure is similar to quoting. The object being to enclose one or more strings between a pair of characters like quotes or parentheses. The terms quoting and enclosure are used interchangeably throughout this document. Most of the one line enclosure macros end in small letter ‘q
’ to give a hint of quoting, but there
are a few irregularities. For each enclosure macro there is also a pair of
open and close macros which end in small letters
‘o
’ and
‘c
’ respectively. These can be used across
one or more lines of text and while they have nesting limitations, the one
line quote macros can be used inside of them.
Quote | Close | Open | Function | Result | |
.Aq | .Ac | .Ao | Angle Bracket Enclosure | <string> | |
.Bq | .Bc | .Bo | Bracket Enclosure | [string] | |
.Dq | .Dc | .Do | Double Quote | ``string'' | |
.Ec | .Eo | Enclose String (in XX) | XXstringXX | ||
.Pq | .Pc | .Po | Parenthesis Enclosure | (string) | |
.Ql | Quoted Literal | `st' or string | |||
.Qc | .Qo | Straight Double Quote | string | ||
.Sq | .Sc | .So | Single Quote | `string' |
.Ec
,.Eo
- These macros expect the first argument to be the opening and closing strings respectively.
.Ql
- The quoted literal macro behaves differently for troff than nroff. If formatted with nroff, a quoted literal is always quoted. If formatted with troff, an item is only quoted if the width of the item is less than three constant width characters. This is to make short strings more visible where the font change to literal (constant width) is less noticeable.
.Pf
- The prefix macro is not callable, but it is parsed:
.Pf ( Fa name2
- becomes (name2.
.Ns
’ (no space) macro performs the analogous suffix function.
.Aq
- ⟨⟩
.Aq Ar ctype.h ) ,
- ⟨ctype.h⟩),
.Bq
- []
.Bq Em Greek , French .
- [Greek, French].
.Dq
- “”
.Dq string abc .
- “string abc”.
.Dq ´^[A-Z]´
- “´^[A-Z]´”
.Ql man mdoc
- ‘
man mdoc
’ .Qq
- “”
.Qq string ) ,
- “string”),
.Qq string Ns ),
- “string),”
.Sq
- ‘’
.Sq string
- ‘string’
.Op
’ option macro. It was created from
the same underlying enclosure macros as those presented in the list above. The
‘.Xo
’ and
‘.Xc
’ extended argument list macros were
also built from the same underlying routines and are a good example of
-mdoc macro usage at its worst.
No-Op or Normal Text Macro¶
The macro ‘.No
’ is a hack for words in a
macro command line which should not be formatted and follows
the conventional syntax for content macros.
Space Macro¶
The ‘.Ns
’ macro eliminates unwanted spaces
in between macro requests. It is useful for old style argument lists where
there is no space between the flag and argument:
.Op Fl I Ns Ar directory
- produces [-Idirectory]
.Ns
’ macro always invokes the
‘.No
’ macro after eliminating the space
unless another macro name follows it. The macro
‘.Ns
’ is parsed and is callable.
Section Cross References¶
The ‘.Sx
’ macro designates a reference to a
section header within the same document. It is parsed and is callable.
.Sx FILES
- FILES
References and Citations¶
The following macros make a modest attempt to handle references. At best, the macros make it convenient to manually drop in a subset of refer style references..Rs
- Reference Start. Causes a line break and begins collection of reference information until the reference end macro is read.
.Re
- Reference End. The reference is printed.
.%A
- Reference author name, one name per invocation.
.%B
- Book title.
.%C
- City/place.
.%D
- Date.
.%J
- Journal name.
.%N
- Issue number.
.%O
- Optional information.
.%P
- Page number.
.%R
- Report name.
.%T
- Title of article.
.%V
- Volume(s).
%
’ are not
callable, and are parsed only for the trade name macro which returns to its
caller. (And not very predictably at the moment either.) The purpose is to
allow trade names to be pretty printed in
troff/ditroff output.
Return Values¶
The ‘.Rv
’ macro generates text for use in
the RETURN VALUES section.
Usage: .Rv [-std function]
.Rv -std atexit
’ will generate the
following text:
The atexit() function returns the value 0 if successful; otherwise the value -1 is returned and the global variable errno is set to indicate the error. The -std option is valid only for manual page sections 2 and 3.
Trade Names (or Acronyms and Type Names)¶
The trade name macro is generally a small caps macro for all upper case words longer than two characters.Usage: .Tn symbol ...
.Tn DEC
- DEC
.Tn ASCII
- ASCII
.Tn
’ macro is parsed and is callable by
other macros.
Extended Arguments¶
The ‘.Xo
’ and
‘.Xc
’ macros allow one to extend an
argument list on a macro boundary. Argument lists cannot be extended within a
macro which expects all of its arguments on one line such as
‘.Op
’.
Here is an example of ‘.Xo
’ using the space
mode macro to turn spacing off:
.Sm off .It Xo Sy I Ar operation .No \en Ar count No \en .Xc .Sm on
- Ioperation\ncount\n
.Sm off .It Cm S No / Ar old_pattern Xo .No / Ar new_pattern .No / Op Cm g .Xc .Sm on
- S/old_pattern/new_pattern/[g]
.Xo
’ and using enclosure
macros: Test the value of an variable.
.It Xo .Ic .ifndef .Oo \&! Oc Ns Ar variable .Op Ar operator variable ... .Xc
- .ifndef [!]variable [operator variable ...]
.Xo
’ macro on the argument list of the
‘.It
’ (list-item) macro. The extend macros
are not used very often, and when they are it is usually to extend the
list-item argument list. Unfortunately, this is also where the extend macros
are the most finicky. In the first two examples, spacing was turned off; in
the third, spacing was desired in part of the output but not all of it. To
make these macros work in this situation make sure the
‘.Xo
’ and
‘.Xc
’ macros are placed as shown in the
third example. If the ‘.Xo
’ macro is not
alone on the ‘.It
’ argument list, spacing
will be unpredictable. The ‘.Ns
’ (no space
macro) must not occur as the first or last macro on a line in this situation.
Out of 900 manual pages (about 1500 actual pages) currently released with
BSD only fifteen use the
‘.Xo
’ macro.
PAGE STRUCTURE DOMAIN¶
Section Headers¶
The first three ‘.Sh
’ section header macros
list below are required in every man page. The remaining section headers are
recommended at the discretion of the author writing the manual page. The
‘.Sh
’ macro can take up to nine arguments.
It is parsed and but is not callable.
- .Sh NAME
- The ‘
.Sh NAME
’ macro is mandatory. If not specified, the headers, footers and page layout defaults will not be set and things will be rather unpleasant. The NAME section consists of at least three items. The first is the ‘.Nm
’ name macro naming the subject of the man page. The second is the Name Description macro, ‘.Nd
’, which separates the subject name from the third item, which is the description. The description should be the most terse and lucid possible, as the space available is small. - .Sh SYNOPSIS
- The SYNOPSIS section
describes the typical usage of the subject of a man page. The macros
required are either ‘
.Nm
’, ‘.Cd
’, ‘.Fn
’, (and possibly ‘.Fo
’, ‘.Fc
’, ‘.Fd
’, ‘.Ft
’ macros). The function name macro ‘.Fn
’ is required for manual page sections 2 and 3, the command and general name macro ‘.Nm
’ is required for sections 1, 5, 6, 7, 8. Section 4 manuals require a ‘.Nm
’, ‘.Fd
’ or a ‘.Cd
’ configuration device usage macro. Several other macros may be necessary to produce the synopsis line as shown below:cat [-benstuv] [-] file ...The following macros were used:.Nm cat
.Op Fl benstuv
.Op Fl
Note: The macros ‘.Ar
.Op
’, ‘.Fl
’, and ‘.Ar
’ recognize the pipe bar character ‘|
’, so a command line such as:will not go orbital. Troff normally interprets a | as a special operator. See PREDEFINED STRINGS for a usable | character in other situations..Op Fl a | Fl b
- .Sh DESCRIPTION
- In most cases the first text in the
DESCRIPTION section is a brief
paragraph on the command, function or file, followed by a lexical list of
options and respective explanations. To create such a list, the
‘
.Bl
’ begin-list, ‘.It
’ list-item and ‘.El
’ end-list macros are used (see Lists and Columns below).
.Sh
’ section headers are part
of the preferred manual page layout and must be used appropriately to maintain
consistency. They are listed in the order in which they would be used.
- .Sh ENVIRONMENT
- The ENVIRONMENT section should reveal any related environment variables and clues to their behavior and/or usage.
- .Sh EXAMPLES
- There are several ways to create examples. See the EXAMPLES section below for details.
- .Sh FILES
- Files which are used or created by the man page subject
should be listed via the ‘
.Pa
’ macro in the FILES section. - .Sh SEE ALSO
- References to other material on the man page topic and
cross references to other relevant man pages should be placed in the
SEE ALSO section. Cross references are
specified using the ‘
.Xr
’ macro. Cross references in the SEE ALSO section should be sorted by section number, and then placed in alphabetical order and comma separated. For example: ls(1), ps(1), group(5), passwd(5). At this time refer(1) style references are not accommodated. - .Sh STANDARDS
- If the command, library function or file adheres to a specific implementation such as IEEE Std 1003.2 (“POSIX.2”) or ANSI X3.159-1989 (“ANSI C89”) this should be noted here. If the command does not adhere to any standard, its history should be noted in the HISTORY section.
- .Sh HISTORY
- Any command which does not adhere to any specific standards should be outlined historically in this section.
- .Sh AUTHORS
- Credits, if need be, should be placed here.
- .Sh DIAGNOSTICS
- Diagnostics from a command should be placed in this section.
- .Sh ERRORS
- Specific error handling, especially from library functions
(man page sections 2 and 3) should go here. The
‘
.Er
’ macro is used to specify an errno. - .Sh BUGS
- Blatant problems with the topic go here...
.Sh
’ sections may be added,
for example, this section was set with:
.Sh PAGE STRUCTURE DOMAIN
Paragraphs and Line Spacing.¶
- .Pp
- The ‘
.Pp
’ paragraph command may be used to specify a line space where necessary. The macro is not necessary after a ‘.Sh
’ or ‘.Ss
’ macro or before a ‘.Bl
’ macro. (The ‘.Bl
’ macro asserts a vertical distance unless the -compact flag is given).
Keeps¶
The only keep that is implemented at this time is for words. The macros are ‘.Bk
’ (begin-keep) and
‘.Ek
’ (end-keep). The only option that
‘.Bk
’ accepts is -words
and is useful for preventing line breaks in the middle of options. In the
example for the make command line arguments (see
What's in a name), the keep
prevented nroff from placing up the flag and the argument on
separate lines. (Actually, the option macro used to prevent this from
occurring, but was dropped when the decision (religious) was made to force
right justified margins in troff as options in general look
atrocious when spread across a sparse line. More work needs to be done with
the keep macros, a -line option needs to be added.)
Examples and Displays¶
There are five types of displays, a quickie one line indented display ‘.D1
’, a quickie one line literal display
‘.Dl
’, and a block literal, block filled
and block ragged which use the ‘.Bd
’
begin-display and ‘.Ed
’ end-display
macros.
.D1
- (D-one) Display one line of indented text. This macro is
parsed, but it is not callable.
The above was produced by:
-ldghfstru
.Dl
-ldghfstru. .Dl
- (D-ell) Display one line of indented
literal text. The
‘
.Dl
’ example macro has been used throughout this file. It allows the indent (display) of one line of text. Its default font is set to constant width (literal) however it is parsed and will recognized other macros. It is not callable however.The above was produced by% ls -ldg /usr/local/bin
.Dl % ls -ldg /usr/local/bin
. .Bd
- Begin-display. The
‘
.Bd
’ display must be ended with the ‘.Ed
’ macro. Displays may be nested within displays and lists. ‘.Bd
’ has the following syntax:The display-type must be one of the following four types and may have an offset specifier for indentation: ‘.Bd display-type [-offset offset_value] [-compact]
.Bd
’.- -ragged
- Display a block of text as typed, right (and left) margin edges are left ragged.
- -filled
- Display a filled (formatted) block. The block of text is formatted (the edges are filled - not left unjustified).
- -literal
- Display a literal block, useful for source code or simple tabbed or spaced text.
- -file file_name
- The file name following the -file flag is read and displayed. Literal mode is asserted and tabs are set at 8 constant width character intervals, however any troff/-mdoc commands in file will be processed.
- -offset string
- If -offset is specified with one of
the following strings, the string is interpreted to indicate the level
of indentation for the forthcoming block of text:
- left
- Align block on the current left margin, this is the
default mode of ‘
.Bd
’. - center
- Supposedly center the block. At this time unfortunately, the block merely gets left aligned about an imaginary center margin.
- indent
- Indents by one default indent value or tab. The
default indent value is also used for the
‘
.D1
’ display so one is guaranteed the two types of displays will line up. This indent is normally set to 6n or about two thirds of an inch (six constant width characters). - indent-two
- Indents two times the default indent value.
- right
- This left aligns the block about two inches from the right side of the page. This macro needs work and perhaps may never do the right thing by troff.
- .Ed
- End-display.
Font Modes¶
There are five macros for changing the appearance of the manual page text:- .Em
- Text may be stressed or emphasized with the
‘
.Em
’ macro. The usual font for emphasis is italic.Usage: .Em argument ...
.Em does not
- does not
.Em exceed 1024 .
- exceed 1024.
.Em vide infra ) ) ,
- vide infra)),
.Em
’ macro is parsed and is callable. It is an error to call ‘.Em
’ without arguments. - .Li
- The ‘
.Li
’ literal macro may be used for special characters, variable constants, anything which should be displayed as it would be typed.Usage: .Li argument ...
.Li \en
\n
.Li M1 M2 M3 ;
M1 M2 M3
;.Li cntrl-D ) ,
cntrl-D
),.Li 1024 ...
1024 ...
.Li
’ macro is parsed and is callable. - .Sy
- The symbolic emphasis macro is generally a boldface macro
in either the symbolic sense or the traditional English usage.
Usage: .Sy symbol ...
.Sy Important Notice
- Important Notice
.Sy
’ macro is parsed and is callable. Arguments to ‘.Sy
’ may be quoted. .Bf
- Begin font mode. The
‘
.Bf
’ font mode must be ended with the ‘.Ef
’ macro. Font modes may be nested within other font modes. ‘.Bf
’ has the following syntax:The font-mode must be one of the following three types: ‘.Bf font-mode
.Bf
’.- Em | -emphasis
- Same as if the
‘
.Em
’ macro was used for the entire block of text. - Li | -literal
- Same as if the
‘
.Li
’ macro was used for the entire block of text. - Sy | -symbolic
- Same as if the
‘
.Sy
’ macro was used for the entire block of text.
- .Ef
- End font mode.
Tagged Lists and Columns¶
There are several types of lists which may be initiated with the ‘.Bl
’ begin-list macro. Items within the
list are specified with the ‘.It
’ item
macro and each list must end with the
‘.El
’ macro. Lists may be nested within
themselves and within displays. Columns may be used inside of lists, but lists
are unproven inside of columns.
In addition, several list attributes may be specified such as the width of a
tag, the list offset, and compactness (blank lines between items allowed or
disallowed). Most of this document has been formatted with a tag style list
(-tag). For a change of pace, the list-type used to present
the list-types is an over-hanging list (-ohang). This type
of list is quite popular with TeX users, but might look a bit funny after
having read many pages of tagged lists. The following list types are accepted
by ‘.Bl
’:
- -bullet
- -item
- -enum
- These three are the simplest types of lists. Once the
‘
.Bl
’ macro has been given, items in the list are merely indicated by a line consisting solely of the ‘.It
’ macro. For example, the source text for a simple enumerated list would look like:.Bl -enum -compact .It Item one goes here. .It And item two here. .It Lastly item three goes here. .El
- Item one goes here.
- And item two here.
- Lastly item three goes here.
.Bl -bullet -compact .It Bullet one goes here. .It Bullet two here. .El
- Bullet one goes here.
- Bullet two here.
- -tag
- -diag
- -hang
- -ohang
- -inset
- These list-types collect arguments specified with the
‘
.It
’ macro and create a label which may be inset into the forthcoming text, hanged from the forthcoming text, overhanged from above and not indented or tagged. This list was constructed with the ‘-ohang
’ list-type. The ‘.It
’ macro is parsed only for the inset, hang and tag list-types and is not callable. Here is an example of inset labels:- Tag
- The tagged list (also called a tagged paragraph) is the most common type of list used in the Berkeley manuals.
- Diag
- Diag lists create section four diagnostic lists and are similar to inset lists except callable macros are ignored.
- Hang
- Hanged labels are a matter of taste.
- Ohang
- Overhanging labels are nice when space is constrained.
- Inset
- Inset labels are useful for controlling blocks of paragraphs and are valuable for converting -mdoc manuals to other formats.
.Bl -inset -offset indent .It Em Tag The tagged list (also called a tagged paragraph) is the most common type of list used in the Berkeley manuals. .It Em Diag Diag lists create section four diagnostic lists and are similar to inset lists except callable macros are ignored. .It Em Hang Hanged labels are a matter of taste. .It Em Ohang Overhanging labels are nice when space is constrained. .It Em Inset Inset labels are useful for controlling blocks of paragraphs and are valuable for converting .Nm -mdoc manuals to other formats. .El
- Hanged
- labels appear similar to tagged lists when the label is smaller than the label width.
- Longer hanged list labels
- blend in to the paragraph unlike tagged paragraph labels.
.Bl -hang -offset indent .It Em Hanged labels appear similar to tagged lists when the label is smaller than the label width. .It Em Longer hanged list labels blend in to the paragraph unlike tagged paragraph labels. .El
- SL
- sleep time of the process (seconds blocked)
- PAGEIN
- number of disk I/O's resulting from references by the process to pages not loaded in core.
- UID
- numerical user-id of process owner
- PPID
- numerical id of parent of process process priority (non-positive when in non-interruptible wait)
.Bl -tag -width "PAGEIN" -compact -offset indent .It SL sleep time of the process (seconds blocked) .It PAGEIN number of disk .Tn I/O Ns 's resulting from references by the process to pages not loaded in core. .It UID numerical user-id of process owner .It PPID numerical id of parent of process process priority (non-positive when in non-interruptible wait) .El
- -width Fl
- sets the width to the default width for a flag. All
callable macros have a default width value. The
‘
.Fl
’, value is presently set to ten constant width characters or about five sixth of an inch. - -width 24n
- sets the width to 24 constant width characters or about
two inches. The ‘
n
’ is absolutely necessary for the scaling to work correctly. - -width ENAMETOOLONG
- sets width to the constant width length of the string given.
- -width \*qint mkfifo\*q
- again, the width is set to the constant width of the string given.
.It
’ is invoked, an attempt is made to determine an appropriate width. If the first argument to ‘.It
’ is a callable macro, the default width for that macro will be used as if the macro name had been supplied as the width. However, if another item in the list is given with a different callable macro name, a new and nested list is assumed.
PREDEFINED STRINGS¶
The following strings are predefined as may be used by preceding with the troff string interpreting sequence ‘\*(xx
’ where
xx is the name of the defined string or as
‘\*x
’ where x is the
name of the string. The interpreting sequence may be used any where in the
text.
String | Nroff | Troff |
<= |
<= | ≤ |
>= |
>= | ≥ |
Rq |
'' | ” |
Lq |
`` | “ |
ua |
^ | ↑ |
aa |
' | ´ |
ga |
` | ` |
q |
" | " |
Pi |
pi | pi |
Ne |
!= | ≠ |
Le |
<= | ≤ |
Ge |
>= | ≥ |
Lt |
< | > |
Gt |
> | < |
Pm |
+- | ± |
If |
infinity | infinity |
Na |
NaN | NaN |
Ba |
| | | |
q
’
should be written as ‘\*q
’ since it is
only one char.
DIAGNOSTICS¶
The debugging facilities for -mdoc are limited, but can help detect subtle errors such as the collision of an argument name with an internal register or macro name. (A what?) A register is an arithmetic storage class for troff with a one or two character name. All registers internal to -mdoc for troff and ditroff are two characters and of the form <upper_case><lower_case> such as ‘Ar
’, <lower_case><upper_case>
as ‘aR
’ or <upper or lower
letter><digit> as ‘C1
’. And
adding to the muddle, troff has its own internal registers
all of which are either two lower case characters or a dot plus a letter or
meta-character character. In one of the introduction examples, it was shown
how to prevent the interpretation of a macro name with the escape sequence
‘\&
’. This is sufficient for the
internal register names also.
If a non-escaped register name is given in the argument list of a request
unpredictable behavior will occur. In general, any time huge portions of text
do not appear where expected in the output, or small strings such as list tags
disappear, chances are there is a misunderstanding about an argument type in
the argument list. Your mother never intended for you to remember this evil
stuff - so here is a way to find out whether or not your arguments are valid:
The ‘.Db
’ (debug) macro displays the
interpretation of the argument list for most macros. Macros such as the
‘.Pp
’ (paragraph) macro do not contain
debugging information. All of the callable macros do, and it is strongly
advised whenever in doubt, turn on the
‘.Db
’ macro.
Usage: .Db [on | off]
aC
’ which should be
‘\&aC
’ in order to work):
.Db on .Op Fl aC Ar file ) .Db off
DEBUGGING ON DEBUG(argv) MACRO: `.Op' Line #: 2 Argc: 1 Argv: `Fl' Length: 2 Space: `' Class: Executable Argc: 2 Argv: `aC' Length: 2 Space: `' Class: Executable Argc: 3 Argv: `Ar' Length: 2 Space: `' Class: Executable Argc: 4 Argv: `file' Length: 4 Space: ` ' Class: String Argc: 5 Argv: `)' Length: 1 Space: ` ' Class: Closing Punctuation or suffix MACRO REQUEST: .Op Fl aC Ar file ) DEBUGGING OFF
.Op
’, and the line number it appears on.
If one or more files are involved (especially if text from another file is
included) the line number may be bogus. If there is only one file, it should
be accurate. The second line gives the argument count, the argument
(‘Fl
’) and its length. If the length of an
argument is two characters, the argument is tested to see if it is executable
(unfortunately, any register which contains a non-zero value appears
executable). The third line gives the space allotted for a class, and the
class type. The problem here is the argument aC should not be executable. The
four types of classes are string, executable, closing punctuation and opening
punctuation. The last line shows the entire argument list as it was read. In
this next example, the offending ‘aC
’ is
escaped:
.Db on .Em An escaped \&aC .Db off
DEBUGGING ON DEBUG(fargv) MACRO: `.Em' Line #: 2 Argc: 1 Argv: `An' Length: 2 Space: ` ' Class: String Argc: 2 Argv: `escaped' Length: 7 Space: ` ' Class: String Argc: 3 Argv: `aC' Length: 2 Space: ` ' Class: String MACRO REQUEST: .Em An escaped &aC DEBUGGING OFF
\&aC
’ shows up with the
same length of 2 as the ‘\&
’ sequence
produces a zero width, but a register named
‘\&aC
’ was not found and the type
classified as string.
Other diagnostics consist of usage statements and are self explanatory.
GROFF, TROFF AND NROFF¶
The -mdoc package does not need compatibility mode with groff. The package inhibits page breaks, and the headers and footers which normally occur at those breaks with nroff, to make the manual more efficient for viewing on-line. At the moment, groff with -Tascii does eject the imaginary remainder of the page at end of file. The inhibiting of the page breaks makes nroff'd files unsuitable for hardcopy. There is a register named ‘cR
’ which can be set to zero in the
site dependent style file /usr/src/share/tmac/doc-nroff to
restore the old style behavior.
FILES¶
- /usr/share/tmac/tmac.doc
- manual macro package
- /usr/share/misc/mdoc.template
- template for writing a man page
- /usr/share/examples/mdoc/*
- several example man pages
SEE ALSO¶
man(1), troff(1), mdoc(7)BUGS¶
Undesirable hyphenation on the dash of a flag argument is not yet resolved, and causes occasional mishaps in the DESCRIPTION section. (line break on the hyphen). Predefined strings are not declared in documentation. Section 3f has not been added to the header routines. ‘.Nm
’ font should be changed in
NAME section.
‘.Fn
’ needs to have a check to prevent
splitting up if the line length is too short. Occasionally it separates the
last parenthesis, and sometimes looks ridiculous if a line is in fill mode.
The method used to prevent header and footer page breaks (other than the initial
header and footer) when using nroff occasionally places an unsightly partially
filled line (blank) at the would be bottom of the page.
The list and display macros to not do any keeps and certainly should be able
to.December 30, 1993 | Debian |