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<meta charset="utf-8">
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<title>Unroff</title>
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</head>
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<body>
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<h1>Unroff</h1><i>Unroff</i> is a Scheme-based, programmable,
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extensible troff translator with a back-end for the Hypertext
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Markup Language. Unroff is free software and is distributed both
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as source and as precompiled binaries.
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<p>Unroff was originally written by Oliver Laumann around 1995.
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It is now maintained by volunteers at the Scheme
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Conservatory.</p>
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<h2>Contents</h2>
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<ul>
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<li>
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<a href="#overview">Overview</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href="#troff">Unroff and Troff</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href="#scheme">Unroff and Scheme</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href="#hypertext">Unroff and Hypertext</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href="#managing">Managing Hypertext Documents with
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Troff</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href="#dist">Source and Binary Distributions</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href="#browse">Browsing Source, Documentation,
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Examples</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href="#news">What's New?</a>
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</li>
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</ul>
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<h2><a name="overview" id="overview">Overview</a></h2>Unroff
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reads and parses UNIX troff documents and translates the embedded
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markup into a different format (see <b>Figure 1</b>). Neither the
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actual output format nor any knowledge about particular troff
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macro sets (-man, -ms, etc.) are hard-wired into unroff. Instead,
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the translation process is controlled by a set of user-supplied
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procedures written in the <a href=
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"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scheme_%28programming_language%29">
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<i>Scheme</i></a> programming language.
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<p>Translation rules for new output formats and troff macro
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packages can be added easily by providing a corresponding set of
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Scheme procedures (a ``back-end''). Version 1.0 of unroff
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includes back-ends for translating documents using the ``man''
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and ``ms'' macros into the Hypertext Markup Language (HTML)
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version 2.0. Additional requests facilitate use of arbitrary
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hypertext links in troff documents.</p>
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<hr>
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<img src="fig1.gif" alt="[Overview of unroff functionality]">
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<hr>
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<h2><a name="troff" id="troff">Unroff and Troff</a></h2>
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<p>In contrast to conventional troff ``converters'' (usually Perl
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scripts some of which process nroff output) unroff includes a
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full troff parser and closely mimics the troff processing engine.
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This enables unroff to handle user-defined macros, strings, and
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number registers, nested if-else requests, arbitrary fonts and
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font positions, low-level formatting requests such as \l, \c, and
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\h, and idiosyncrasies such as troff <i>copy mode</i> and the
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subtle differences between request and macro invocations. Unroff
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has adopted a number of <i>groff</i> extensions, among them long
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names for macros, strings, number registers, and special
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characters, and the escape sequences \$@ and \$*.</p>
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<h2><a name="scheme" id="scheme">Unroff and Scheme</a></h2>Unroff
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uses <a href=
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"http://www.informatik.uni-bremen.de/~net/elk"><i>Elk</i></a>,
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the Scheme-based Extension Language Kit, to achieve
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programmability (see <b>Figure 2</b>). It includes a full Scheme
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language implementation with the usual amenities such as garbage
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collection, interactive programming and testing, and dynamic
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loading. To help writing new unroff back-ends, unroff has
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augmented standard Scheme by a set of new Scheme data types and
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primitives.
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<hr>
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<img src="fig2.gif" alt=
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"[unroff and Elk/Scheme-code relationship]">
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<hr>
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<p>A new troff request and an extension to the `.ig' request
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allow for Scheme code to be embedded in troff documents; the code
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is then evaluated on the fly as the documents are processed by
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unroff.</p>
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<p>Unroff may be viewed as a prototype for hybrid applications
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that use Scheme (in particular Elk) as their extension language.
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Approximately half of its source consists of portable ANSI C
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code, and the other half is written in Scheme and can be
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configured and tailored easily without the need to recompile
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unroff. Authors of Elk-based applications are encouraged to look
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into the source code or reuse parts of it for their own
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projects.</p>
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<p>As the time-critical Scheme primitives provided of unroff have
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been coded in (efficient) C, its performance comes close to that
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of nroff processing the same troff input.</p>
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<h2><a name="hypertext" id="hypertext">Unroff and
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Hypertext</a></h2>troff documents that were originally written
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without intentions to make them available in the World Wide Web
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(such as UNIX manual pages) can easily be translated to the
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Hypertext Markup Language using the predefined HTML back-ends.
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<p>As unroff closely simulates ordinary troff, even large or
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complex documents (like technical reports or theses with many
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user-defined macros) can be translated to HTML automatically
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without having to add any structural cues to the documents.</p>
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<p>The ``-man'' support has been tested with several hundred
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vendor- and user-supplied manual pages and has produced good
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results in all but less than a dozen cases (a few manual pages
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were found to make excessive use of low-level troff constructs or
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to include <i>tbl</i> output verbatim).</p>
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<h2><a name="managing" id="managing">Managing Hypertext Documents
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with Troff</a></h2>Authors can benefit from unroff not only as a
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converter for existing documents, but also when writing new
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documents that must exist both in high-quality paper form and in
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the World Wide Web as hypertext.
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<p>Rather than writing hypertext documents directly in HTML
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(which is cumbersome for long or complex texts), authors can
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continue using ordinary troff together with the usual
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preprocessors and macro packages. Unroff is then employed to
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produce the WWW form, while troff is used in the normal way to
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typeset the same text, producing the printed version (or, using
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nroff, an ASCII version if desired).</p>
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<p>In this way authors of hypertext documents can take full
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advantage of the usual troff facilities such as user-defined
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macros, conditional text, tables, equations, and drawings,
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automatic table of contents generation, footnotes/endnotes,
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indexes, etc., none of which are available when composing
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documents directly in plain HTML.</p>
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<p>Two new troff requests for embedding hypertext links in troff
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documents are provided by the unroff HTML back-end. Arbitrary
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forward and backward references using symbolic labels (rather
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than actual file names) among groups of troff source files are
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supported (see <b>Figure 3</b>). Another new request and another
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extension to `.ig' allow for HTML code to be embedded directly in
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troff documents. The hypertext capabilities are demonstrated by
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the troff source of the Programmer's Manual that is part of the
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unroff distribution.</p>
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<hr>
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<img src="fig3.gif" alt="[troff document with hypertext links]">
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<hr>
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<h2><a name="dist" id="dist">Source and Binary
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Distributions</a></h2>You need Elk 2.2 or <a href=
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"http://www.informatik.uni-bremen.de/~net/elk">Elk 3.0</a> and an
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ANSI C compiler to compile and install unroff from the source
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distribution.
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<p>If you do not have Elk at your site and do not want to install
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it, or if you just wish to have a quick look at unroff, download
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the binary distribution for your system. Otherwise, use of the
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source distribution is recommended.</p>
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<p>The unroff executable is linked dynamically in the binary
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distributions for systems with shared libraries.</p>
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<ul>
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<li>
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<b>Source Distribution</b> (about 80 Kbytes)
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<ul>
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<li>
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<a href=
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"https://files.scheme.org/unroff-1.0.tar.gz">unroff-1.0.tar.gz</a>
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</li>
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</ul>
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</li>
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2023-02-14 03:28:12 -05:00
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</ul>
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<ul>
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<li>
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<b>Binary Distributions</b> (about 200 Kbytes each)
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<ul>
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<li>
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<a href=
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"https://files.scheme.org/unroff-1.0-alpha-dec-osf3.0.tar.gz">
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unroff-1.0-alpha-dec-osf3.0.tar.gz</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href=
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"https://files.scheme.org/unroff-1.0-hppa1.1-hp-hpux9.tar.gz">
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unroff-1.0-hppa1.1-hp-hpux9.tar.gz</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href=
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"https://files.scheme.org/unroff-1.0-i486-unknown-linux1.2.8.tar.gz">
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unroff-1.0-i486-unknown-linux1.2.8.tar.gz</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href=
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"https://files.scheme.org/unroff-1.0-m68k-next-ns3.tar.gz">
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unroff-1.0-m68k-next-ns3.tar.gz</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href=
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"https://files.scheme.org/unroff-1.0-mips-dec-ultrix4.2.tar.gz">
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unroff-1.0-mips-dec-ultrix4.2.tar.gz</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href=
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"https://files.scheme.org/unroff-1.0-mips-sgi-irix5.3.tar.gz">
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2023-03-08 18:43:46 -05:00
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unroff-1.0-mips-sgi-irix5.3.tar.gz</a>
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2023-02-14 13:36:57 -05:00
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href=
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"https://files.scheme.org/unroff-1.0-rs6000-ibm-aix3.2.tar.gz">
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unroff-1.0-rs6000-ibm-aix3.2.tar.gz</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href=
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"https://files.scheme.org/unroff-1.0-sparc-sun-solaris2.tar.gz">
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unroff-1.0-sparc-sun-solaris2.tar.gz</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href=
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"https://files.scheme.org/unroff-1.0-sparc-sun-sunos4.tar.gz">
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unroff-1.0-sparc-sun-sunos4.tar.gz</a>
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</li>
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</ul>
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</li>
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2023-02-14 03:28:12 -05:00
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</ul>
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<ul>
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<li>The <b>Elk 3.0 Distribution</b> is available here:
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<ul>
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<li>
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<a href=
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"ftp://ftp.x.org/contrib/devel_tools/elk-3.0.tar.gz">X
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Consortium Public FTP Server</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href=
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"ftp://ftp.cs.indiana.edu/pub/scheme-repository/imp/elk-3.0.tar.gz">
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Scheme Repository at Indiana University</a>
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</li>
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<li>
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<a href=
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2023-02-14 13:42:24 -05:00
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"ftp://ftp.tzi.uni-bremen.de/tzi/dmn/elk/elk-3.0.tar.gz">Universität
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2023-02-14 13:36:57 -05:00
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Bremen, Germany</a>
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</li>
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</ul>
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</li>
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</ul>
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<h2><a name="browse" id="browse">Browsing Source, Documentation,
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Examples</a></h2>You can have a look at the unroff source code
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and documentation without having to download the distribution.
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All the HTML documents mentioned below have been produced with
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unroff from the corresponding troff source (observe the
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automatically created hypertext links in the Programmer's
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Manual).
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<ul>
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<li>
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<b>Source Code</b>
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<ul>
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<li>Snoop around in the <a href=
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"https://gitea.scheme.org/conservatory/unroff">unroff</a>
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source tree
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</li>
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</ul>
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</li>
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2023-02-14 03:28:12 -05:00
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</ul>
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<ul>
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<li>
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<b>Documentation</b>
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<ul>
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<li>Manual page <b>unroff.1</b> as <a href=
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"doc/unroff.1.html">HTML</a>, <a href=
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"doc/unroff.1.ps">PostScript</a>, <a href=
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"doc/unroff.1">source</a>
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</li>
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<li>Manual page <b>unroff-html.1</b> as <a href=
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"doc/unroff-html.1.html">HTML</a>, <a href=
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"doc/unroff-html.1.ps">PostScript</a>, <a href=
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"doc/unroff-html.1">source</a>
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</li>
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<li>Manual page <b>unroff-html-man.1</b> as <a href=
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"doc/unroff-html-man.1.html">HTML</a>, <a href=
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"doc/unroff-html-man.1.ps">PostScript</a>, <a href=
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"doc/unroff-html-man.1">source</a>
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</li>
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<li>Manual page <b>unroff-html-ms.1</b> as <a href=
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"doc/unroff-html-ms.1.html">HTML</a>, <a href=
|
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"doc/unroff-html-ms.1.ps">PostScript</a>, <a href=
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|
"doc/unroff-html-ms.1">source</a>
|
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|
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</li>
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|
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<li>
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|
|
|
|
<b>Programmer's Manual</b> as HTML
|
2023-02-14 13:38:47 -05:00
|
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|
<ul>
|
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|
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<li>
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|
<a href="doc/manual.html">single document</a>
|
|
|
|
|
</li>
|
|
|
|
|
<li>
|
|
|
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|
<a href="doc/m.html">split at level-1 headers</a>
|
|
|
|
|
</li>
|
|
|
|
|
</ul>
|
2023-02-14 13:36:57 -05:00
|
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|
</li>
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|
|
|
<li>
|
|
|
|
|
<b>Programmer's Manual</b> as <a href=
|
|
|
|
|
"doc/manual.ps">PostScript</a> or <a href=
|
|
|
|
|
"doc/manual.ms">source</a>
|
|
|
|
|
</li>
|
|
|
|
|
</ul>
|
|
|
|
|
</li>
|
2023-02-14 03:28:12 -05:00
|
|
|
</ul>
|
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|
|
|
<ul>
|
2023-02-14 13:36:57 -05:00
|
|
|
<li>
|
|
|
|
|
<b>More Examples</b>
|
|
|
|
|
<ul>
|
|
|
|
|
<li>X11R6 Release Notes in -ms format (<a href=
|
|
|
|
|
"examples/RELNOTES.ms">source</a>)
|
2023-02-14 13:38:47 -05:00
|
|
|
<ul>
|
|
|
|
|
<li>
|
|
|
|
|
<a href="examples/rel.html">single HTML
|
|
|
|
|
document</a><br>
|
|
|
|
|
with user-defined TOC at end (-ms index macros)
|
|
|
|
|
</li>
|
|
|
|
|
<li>
|
|
|
|
|
<a href="examples/r.html">split at level-1
|
|
|
|
|
headers</a><br>
|
|
|
|
|
with automatic TOC at first page
|
|
|
|
|
</li>
|
|
|
|
|
</ul>
|
2023-02-14 13:36:57 -05:00
|
|
|
</li>
|
|
|
|
|
<li>UNIX <a href="examples/pathconf.2.html">man page</a>
|
|
|
|
|
with tables (<a href="examples/pathconf.2">pathconf.2</a>)
|
|
|
|
|
</li>
|
|
|
|
|
<li>X11 <a href="examples/XtSetArg.3.html">man page</a>
|
|
|
|
|
with user-defined macros (<a href=
|
|
|
|
|
"examples/XtSetArg.3">XtSetArg.3</a>)
|
|
|
|
|
</li>
|
|
|
|
|
</ul>
|
|
|
|
|
</li>
|
2023-02-14 03:28:12 -05:00
|
|
|
</ul>
|
2023-02-14 13:36:57 -05:00
|
|
|
<h2><a name="news" id="news">What's New?</a></h2>
|
|
|
|
|
<p><i>January 28, 1996:</i> <b>Unofficial Patch with -me
|
|
|
|
|
support</b></p>
|
2023-02-14 13:38:47 -05:00
|
|
|
<blockquote>
|
|
|
|
|
George Helffrich has contributed a patch for unroff-1.0 that
|
|
|
|
|
includes, among other things, an experimental implementation of
|
|
|
|
|
a backend for the -me macros and several fixes for the code
|
|
|
|
|
that deals with equations. A detailed table of contents of at
|
|
|
|
|
the beginning of the patch kit:
|
|
|
|
|
<p><a href=
|
|
|
|
|
"contrib/me-misc-patch.diff"><b>me-misc-patch</b></a> <i>(39
|
|
|
|
|
kbytes)</i></p>
|
|
|
|
|
</blockquote>
|
2023-02-14 13:36:57 -05:00
|
|
|
<p><i>February 13, 1997:</i> <b>Another Unofficial
|
|
|
|
|
Patch</b></p>
|
2023-02-14 13:38:47 -05:00
|
|
|
<blockquote>
|
|
|
|
|
George Helffrich has contributed another large patch kit for
|
|
|
|
|
unroff-1.0 that fixes several things in the -me support
|
|
|
|
|
contributed earlier and in the -ms package and also adds some
|
|
|
|
|
new functionality.
|
|
|
|
|
<p><a href="contrib/misc-patch-2.diff"><b>misc-patch-2</b></a>
|
|
|
|
|
<i>(79 kbytes)</i></p>
|
|
|
|
|
</blockquote>
|
2023-02-14 03:28:12 -05:00
|
|
|
</body>
|
|
|
|
|
</html>
|
