GROFF_OUT(5) GROFF_OUT(5)
NAME
groff_out - groff intermediate output format
DESCRIPTION
This manual page describes the intermediate output format of the GNU roff(7) text
processing system. This output is produced by a run of the GNU troff(1) program
before it is fed into a device postprocessor program.
As the GNU roff processor groff(1) is a wrapper program around troff that automati-
cally calls a postprocessor, this output does not show up normally. This is why it
is called intermediate within the groff system. The groff program provides the
option -Z to inhibit postprocessing, such that the produced intermediate output is
sent to standard output just like calling troff manually.
In this document, the term troff output describes what is output by the GNU troff
program, while intermediate output refers to the language that is accepted by the
parser that prepares this output for the postprocessors. This parser is smarter on
whitespace and implements obsolete elements for compatibility, otherwise both for-
mats are the same. The pre-groff roff versions are denoted as classical troff.
The main purpose of the intermediate output concept is to facilitate the develop-
ment of postprocessors by providing a common programming interface for all devices.
It has a language of its own that is completely different from the groff(7) lan-
guage. While the groff language is a high-level programming language for text pro-
cessing, the intermediate output language is a kind of low-level assembler language
by specifying all positions on the page for writing and drawing.
The intermediate output produced by groff is fairly readable, while classical troff
output was hard to understand because of strange habits that are still supported,
but not used any longer by GNU troff.
LANGUAGE CONCEPTS
During the run of troff, the roff input is cracked down to the information on what
has to be printed at what position on the intended device. So the language of the
intermediate output format can be quite small. Its only elements are commands with
or without arguments. In this document, the term "command" always refers to the
intermediate output language, never to the roff language used for document format-
ting. There are commands for positioning and text writing, for drawing, and for
device controlling.
Separation
Classical troff output had strange requirements on whitespace. The groff output
parser, however, is smart about whitespace by making it maximally optional. The
whitespace characters, i.e. the tab, space, and newline characters, always have a
syntactical meaning. They are never printable because spacing within the output is
always done by positioning commands.
Any sequence of space or tab characters is treated as a single syntactical space.
It separates commands and arguments, but is only required when there would occur a
clashing between the command code and the arguments without the space. Most often,
this happens when variable length command names, arguments, argument lists, or com-
mand clusters meet. Commands and arguments with a known, fixed length need not be
separated by syntactical space.
A line break is a syntactical element, too. Every command argument can be followed
by whitespace, a comment, or a newline character. Thus a syntactical line break is
defined to consist of optional syntactical space that is optionally followed by a
comment, and a newline character.
The normal commands, those for positioning and text, consist of a single letter
taking a fixed number of arguments. For historical reasons, the parser allows to
stack such commands on the same line, but fortunately, in groff intermediate
output, every command with at least one argument is followed by a line break, thus
providing excellent readability.
The other commands — those for drawing and device controlling — have a more compli-
cated structure; some recognize long command names, and some take a variable number
of arguments. So all D and x commands were designed to request a syntactical line
break after their last argument. Only one command, ‘x X’ has an argument that can
stretch over several lines, all other commands must have all of their arguments on
the same line as the command, i.e. the arguments may not be splitted by a line
break.
Empty lines, i.e. lines containing only space and/or a comment, can occur every-
where. They are just ignored.
Argument Units
Some commands take integer arguments that are assumed to represent values in a mea-
surement unit, but the letter for the corresponding scale indicator is not written
with the output command arguments; see groff(7) and the groff info file for more on
this topic. Most commands assume the scale indicator u, the basic unit of the
device, some use z, the scaled point unit of the device, while others, such as the
color commands expect plain integers. Note that these scale indicators are rela-
tive to the chosen device. They are defined by the parameters specified in the
device’s DESC file; see groff_font(5).
Note that single characters can have the eighth bit set, as can the names of fonts
and special characters. The names of characters and fonts can be of arbitrary
length. A character that is to be printed will always be in the current font.
A string argument is always terminated by the next whitespace character (space,
tab, or newline); an embedded # character is regarded as part of the argument, not
as the beginning of a comment command. An integer argument is already terminated
by the next non-digit character, which then is regarded as the first character of
the next argument or command.
Document Parts
A correct intermediate output document consists of two parts, the prologue and the
body.
The task of the prologue is to set the general device parameters using three
exactly specified commands. The groff prologue is guaranteed to consist of the
following three lines (in that order):
x T device
x res n h v
x init
with the arguments set as outlined in the section Device Control Commands. But the
parser for the intermediate output format is able to swallow additional whitespace
and comments as well.
The body is the main section for processing the document data. Syntactically, it
is a sequence of any commands different from the ones used in the prologue. Pro-
cessing is terminated as soon as the first x stop command is encountered; the last
line of any groff intermediate output always contains such a command.
Semantically, the body is page oriented. A new page is started by a p command.
Positioning, writing, and drawing commands are always done within the current page,
so they cannot occur before the first p command. Absolute positioning (by the H
and V commands) is done relative to the current page, all other positioning is done
relative to the current location within this page.
COMMAND REFERENCE
This section describes all intermediate output commands, the classical commands as
well as the groff extensions.
Comment Command
#anythingâŒâŒ©end_of_lineâŒâŒª
A comment. Ignore any characters from the # character up to the next new-
line character.
This command is the only possibility for commenting in the intermediate output.
Each comment can be preceded by arbitrary syntactical space; every command can be
terminated by a comment.
Simple Commands
The commands in this subsection have a command code consisting of a single charac-
ter, taking a fixed number of arguments. Most of them are commands for positioning
and text writing. These commands are smart about whitespace. Optionally, syntac-
tical space can be inserted before, after, and between the command letter and its
arguments. All of these commands are stackable, i.e., they can be preceded by
other simple commands or followed by arbitrary other commands on the same line. A
separating syntactical space is only necessary when two integer arguments would
clash or if the preceding argument ends with a string argument.
C xxx〈white_space〉
Print a special groff character named xxx. The trailing syntactical space
or line break is necessary to allow character names of arbitrary length.
The character is printed at the current print position; the character’s size
is read from the font file. The print position is not changed.
c c Print character c at the current print position; the character’s size is
read from the font file. The print position is not changed.
f n Set font to font number n (a non-negative integer).
H n Move right to the absolute vertical position n (a non-negative integer in
basic units u) relative to left edge of current page.
h n Move n (a non-negative integer) basic units u horizontally to the right.
[54] allows negative values for n also, but groff doesn’t use this.
m color_scheme [component ...]
Set the color for text (glyphs), line drawing, and the outline of graphic
objects using different color schemes; the analoguous command for the fill-
ing color of graphic objects is DF. The color components are specified as
integer arguments between 0 and 65536. The number of color components and
their meaning vary for the different color schemes. These commands are gen-
erated by the groff escape sequence \m. No position changing. These com-
mands are a groff extension.
mc cyan magenta yellow
Set color using the CMY color scheme, having the 3 color components
cyan, magenta, and yellow.
md Set color to the default color value (black in most cases). No com-
ponent arguments.
mg gray
Set color to the shade of gray given by the argument, an integer
between 0 (black) and 65536 (white).
mk cyan magenta yellow black
Set color using the CMYK color scheme, having the 4 color components
cyan, magenta, yellow, and black.
mr red green blue
Set color using the RGB color scheme, having the 3 color components
red, green, and blue.
N n Print character with index n (a non-negative integer) of the current font.
The print position is not changed. This command is a groff extension.
n b a Inform the device about a line break, but no positioning is done by this
command. In classical troff, the integer arguments b and a informed about
the space before and after the current line to make the intermediate output
more human readable without performing any action. In groff, they are just
ignored, but they must be provided for compatibility reasons.
p n Begin a new page in the outprint. The page number is set to n. This page
is completely independent of pages formerly processed even if those have the
same page number. The vertical position on the outprint is automatically
set to 0. All positioning, writing, and drawing is always done relative to
a page, so a p command must be issued before any of these commands.
s n Set point size to n scaled points (this is unit z in GNU troff). Classical
troff used the unit points (p) instead; see section COMPATIBILITY.
t xxx〈white_space〉
t xxx dummy_arg〈white_space〉
Print a word, i.e. a sequence of characters xxx terminated by a space char-
acter or a line break; an optional second integer argument is ignored (this
allows the formatter to generate an even number of arguments). The first
character should be printed at the current position, the current horizontal
position should then be increased by the width of the first character, and
so on for each character. The widths of the characters are read from the
font file, scaled for the current point size, and rounded to a multiple of
the horizontal resolution. Special characters cannot be printed using this
command (use the C command for named characters). This command is a groff
extension; it is only used for devices whose DESC file contains the tcommand
keyword; see groff_font(5).
u n xxx〈white_space〉
Print word with track kerning. This is the same as the t command except
that after printing each character, the current horizontal position is
increased by the sum of the width of that character and n (an integer in
basic units u). This command is a groff extension; it is only used for
devices whose DESC file contains the tcommand keyword; see groff_font(5).
V n Move down to the absolute vertical position n (a non-negative integer in
basic units u) relative to upper edge of current page.
v n Move n basic units u down (n is a non-negative integer). [54] allows nega-
tive values for n also, but groff doesn’t use this.
w Informs about a paddable whitespace to increase readability. The spacing
itself must be performed explicitly by a move command.
Graphics Commands
Each graphics or drawing command in the intermediate output starts with the let-
ter D followed by one or two characters that specify a subcommand; this is followed
by a fixed or variable number of integer arguments that are separated by a single
space character. A D command may not be followed by another command on the same
line (apart from a comment), so each D command is terminated by a syntactical line
break.
troff output follows the classical spacing rules (no space between command and sub-
command, all arguments are preceded by a single space character), but the parser
allows optional space between the command letters and makes the space before the
first argument optional. As usual, each space can be any sequence of tab and space
characters.
Some graphics commands can take a variable number of arguments. In this case, they
are integers representing a size measured in basic units u. The arguments called
h1, h2, ..., hn h1, h2, ..., hn stand for horizontal distances where positive means
right, negative left. The arguments called v1, v2, ..., vn v1, v2, ..., vn stand
for vertical distances where positive means down, negative up. All these distances
are offsets relative to the current location.
Unless indicated otherwise, each graphics command directly corresponds to a similar
groff \D escape sequence; see groff(7).
Unknown D commands are assumed to be device-specific. Its arguments are parsed as
strings; the whole information is then sent to the postprocessor.
In the following command reference, the syntax element 〈line_break〉 means a syntac-
tical line break as defined in section Separation.
D~ h1 v1 h2 v2 ... hn vn〈line_break〉
Draw B-spline from current position to offset (h1, v1), then to offset
(h2, v2) if given, etc. up to (hn, vn). This command takes a variable number
of argument pairs; the current position is moved to the terminal point of
the drawn curve.
Da h1 v1 h2 v2〈line_break〉
Draw arc from current position to (h1, v1)+(h2, v2) with center at (h1, v1);
then move the current position to the final point of the arc.
DC d〈line_break〉
DC d dummy_arg〈line_break〉
Draw a solid circle using the current fill color with diameter d (integer in
basic units u) with leftmost point at the current position; then move the
current position to the rightmost point of the circle. An optional second
integer argument is ignored (this allows to the formatter to generate an
even number of arguments). This command is a groff extension.
Dc d〈line_break〉
Draw circle line with diameter d (integer in basic units u) with leftmost
point at the current position; then move the current position to the right-
most point of the circle.
DE h v〈line_break〉
Draw a solid ellipse in the current fill color with a horizontal diameter
of h and a vertical diameter of v (both integers in basic units u) with the
leftmost point at the current position; then move to the rightmost point of
the ellipse. This command is a groff extension.
De h v〈line_break〉
Draw an outlined ellipse with a horizontal diameter of h and a vertical
diameter of v (both integers in basic units u) with the leftmost point at
current position; then move to the rightmost point of the ellipse.
DF color_scheme [component ...]〈line_break〉
Set fill color for solid drawing objects using different color schemes; the
analoguous command for setting the color of text, line graphics, and the
outline of graphic objects is m. The color components are specified as
integer arguments between 0 and 65536. The number of color components and
their meaning vary for the different color schemes. These commands are gen-
erated by the groff escape sequences \Dâ€â€™F ...â€â€™ and \M (with no other corre-
sponding graphics commands). No position changing. This command is a groff
extension.
DFc cyan magenta yellow〈line_break〉
Set fill color for solid drawing objects using the CMY color scheme,
having the 3 color components cyan, magenta, and yellow.
DFd 〈line_break〉
Set fill color for solid drawing objects to the default fill color
value (black in most cases). No component arguments.
DFg gray〈line_break〉
Set fill color for solid drawing objects to the shade of gray given
by the argument, an integer between 0 (black) and 65536 (white).
DFk cyan magenta yellow black〈line_break〉
Set fill color for solid drawing objects using the CMYK color scheme,
having the 4 color components cyan, magenta, yellow, and black.
DFr red green blue〈line_break〉
Set fill color for solid drawing objects using the RGB color scheme,
having the 3 color components red, green, and blue.
Df n〈line_break〉
The argument n must be an integer in the range -32767 to 32767.
0 ≤ n ≤ 1000
Set the color for filling solid drawing objects to a shade of gray,
where 0 corresponds to solid white, 1000 (the default) to solid
black, and values in between to intermediate shades of gray; this is
obsoleted by command DFg.
n < 0 or n > 1000
Set the filling color to the color that is currently being used for
the text and the outline, see command m. For example, the command
sequence
mg 0 0 65536
Df -1
sets all colors to blue.
No position changing. This command is a groff extension.
Dl h v〈line_break〉
Draw line from current position to offset (h, v) (integers in basic
units u); then set current position to the end of the drawn line.
Dp h1 v1 h2 v2 ... hn vn〈line_break〉
Draw a polygon line from current position to offset (h1, v1), from there to
offset (h2, v2), etc. up to offset (hn, vn), and from there back to the
starting position. For historical reasons, the position is changed by
adding the sum of all arguments with odd index to the actual horizontal
position and the even ones to the vertical position. Although this doesn’t
make sense it is kept for compatibility. This command is a groff extension.
DP h1 v1 h2 v2 ... hn vn〈line_break〉
The same macro as the corresponding Dp command with the same arguments, but
draws a solid polygon in the current fill color rather than an outlined
polygon. The position is changed in the same way as with Dp. This command
is a groff extension.
Dt n〈line_break〉
Set the current line thickness to n (an integer in basic units u) if n>0; if
n=0 select the smallest available line thickness; if n<0 set the line thick-
ness proportional to the point size (this is the default before the first Dt
command was specified). For historical reasons, the horizontal position is
changed by adding the argument to the actual horizontal position, while the
vertical position is not changed. Although this doesn’t make sense it is
kept for compatibility. This command is a groff extension.
Device Control Commands
Each device control command starts with the letter x followed by a space character
(optional or arbitrary space/tab in groff) and a subcommand letter or word; each
argument (if any) must be preceded by a syntactical space. All x commands are ter-
minated by a syntactical line break; no device control command can be followed by
another command on the same line (except a comment).
The subcommand is basically a single letter, but to increase readability, it can be
written as a word, i.e. an arbitrary sequence of characters terminated by the next
tab, space, or newline character. All characters of the subcommand word but the
first are simply ignored. For example, troff outputs the initialization command
x i as x init and the resolution command x r as x res. But writings like
x i_like_groff and x roff_is_groff resp. are accepted as well to mean the same com-
mands.
In the following, the syntax element 〈line_break〉 means a syntactical line break as
defined in section Separation.
xF name〈line_break〉
(Filename control command)
Use name as the intended name for the current file in error reports. This
is useful for remembering the original file name when groff uses an internal
piping mechanism. The input file is not changed by this command. This com-
mand is a groff extension.
xf n s〈line_break〉
(font control command)
Mount font position n (a non-negative integer) with font named s (a text
word), cf. groff_font(5).
xH n〈line_break〉
(Height control command)
Set character height to n (a positive integer in scaled points z). Classi-
cal troff used the unit points (p) instead; see section COMPATIBILITY.
xi〈line_break〉
(init control command)
Initialize device. This is the third command of the prologue.
xp〈line_break〉
(pause control command)
Parsed but ignored. The classical documentation reads pause device, can be
restarted.
xr n h v〈line_break〉
(resolution control command)
Resolution is n, while h is the minimal horizontal motion, and v the minimal
vertical motion possible with this device; all arguments are positive inte-
gers in basic units u per inch. This is the second command of the prologue.
xS n〈line_break〉
(Slant control command)
Set slant to n (an integer in basic units u).
xs〈line_break〉
(stop control command)
Terminates the processing of the current file; issued as the last command of
any intermediate troff output.
xt〈line_break〉
(trailer control command)
Generate trailer information, if any. In groff, this is actually just
ignored.
xT xxx〈line_break〉
(Typesetter control command)
Set name of device to word xxx, a sequence of characters ended by the next
whitespace character. The possible device names coincide with those from
the groff -T option. This is the first command of the prologue.
xu n〈line_break〉
(underline control command)
Configure underlining of spaces. If n is 1, start underlining of spaces; if
n is 0, stop underlining of spaces. This is needed for the cu request in
nroff mode and is ignored otherwise. This command is a groff extension.
xX anything〈line_break〉
(X-escape control command)
Send string anything uninterpreted to the device. If the line following
this command starts with a + character this line is interpreted as a contin-
uation line in the following sense. The + is ignored, but a newline charac-
ter is sent instead to the device, the rest of the line is sent uninter-
preted. The same applies to all following lines until the first character
of a line is not a + character. This command is generated by the groff
escape sequence \X. The line-continuing feature is a groff extension.
Obsolete Command
In classical troff output, the writing of a single character was mostly done by a
very strange command that combined a horizontal move and the printing of a charac-
ter. It didn’t have a command code, but is represented by a 3-character argument
consisting of exactly 2 digits and a character.
ddc Move right dd (exactly two decimal digits) basic units u, then print charac-
ter c.
In groff, arbitrary syntactical space around and within this command is
allowed to be added. Only when a preceding command on the same line ends
with an argument of variable length a separating space is obligatory. In
classical troff, large clusters of these and other commands were used,
mostly without spaces; this made such output almost unreadable.
For modern high-resolution devices, this command does not make sense because the
width of the characters can become much larger than two decimal digits. In groff,
this is only used for the devices X75, X75-12, X100, and X100-12. For other
devices, the commands t and u provide a better functionality.
POSTPROCESSING
The roff postprocessors are programs that have the task to translate the intermedi-
ate output into actions that are sent to a device. A device can be some piece of
hardware such as a printer, or a software file format suitable for graphical or
text processing. The groff system provides powerful means that make the program-
ming of such postprocessors an easy task.
There is a library function that parses the intermediate output and sends the
information obtained to the device via methods of a class with a common interface
for each device. So a groff postprocessor must only redefine the methods of this
class. For details, see the reference in section FILES.
EXAMPLES
This section presents the intermediate output generated from the same input for
three different devices. The input is the sentence hell world fed into groff on
the command line.
· High-resolution device ps
shell> echo hell world | groff -Z -T ps
x T ps
x res 72000 1 1
x init
p1
x font 5 TR
f5
s10000
V12000
H72000
thell
wh2500
tw
H96620
torld
n12000 0
x trailer
V792000
x stop
This output can be fed into the postprocessor grops(1) to get its representation as
a PostScript file.
· Low-resolution device latin1
This is similar to the high-resolution device except that the positioning is done
at a minor scale. Some comments (lines starting with #) were added for clarifi-
cation; they were not generated by the formatter.
shell> echo hell world | groff -Z -T latin1
# prologue
x T latin1
x res 240 24 40
x init
# begin a new page
p1
# font setup
x font 1 R
f1
s10
# initial positioning on the page
V40
H0
# write text ‘hell’
thell
# inform about a space, and do it by a horizontal jump
wh24
# write text ‘world’
tworld
# announce line break, but do nothing because ...
n40 0
# ... the end of the document has been reached
x trailer
V2640
x stop
This output can be fed into the postprocessor grotty(1) to get a formatted text
document.
· Classical style output
As a computer monitor has a very low resolution compared to modern printers the
intermediate output for the X devices can use the jump-and-write command with its
2-digit displacements.
shell> echo hell world | groff -Z -T X100
x T X100
x res 100 1 1
x init
p1
x font 5 TR
f5
s10
V16
H100
# write text with old-style jump-and-write command
ch07e07l03lw06w11o07r05l03dh7
n16 0
x trailer
V1100
x stop
This output can be fed into the postprocessor xditview(1x) or gxditview(1) for dis-
playing in X.
Due to the obsolete jump-and-write command, the text clusters in the classical out-
put are almost unreadable.
COMPATIBILITY
The intermediate output language of the classical troff was first documented in
[97]. The groff intermediate output format is compatible with this specification
except for the following features.
· The classical quasi device independence is not yet implemented.
· The old hardware was very different from what we use today. So the groff devices
are also fundamentally different from the ones in classical troff. For example,
the classical PostScript device was called post and had a resolution of 720 units
per inch, while groff’s ps device has a resolution of 72000 units per inch.
Maybe, by implementing some rescaling mechanism similar to the classical quasi
device independence, these could be integrated into modern groff.
· The B-spline command D~ is correctly handled by the intermediate output parser,
but the drawing routines aren’t implemented in some of the postprocessor pro-
grams.
· The argument of the commands s and x H has the implicit unit scaled point z in
groff, while classical troff had point (p). This isn’t an incompatibility, but a
compatible extension, for both units coincide for all devices without a sizescale
parameter, including all classical and the groff text devices. The few groff
devices with a sizescale parameter either did not exist, had a different name, or
seem to have had a different resolution. So conflicts with classical devices are
very unlikely.
· The position changing after the commands Dp, DP, and Dt is illogical, but as old
versions of groff used this feature it is kept for compatibility reasons.
The differences between groff and classical troff are documented in groff_diff(7).
FILES
/usr/share/groff/1.18.1.1/font/devname/DESC
Device description file for device name.
〈groff_source_dir〉/src/libs/libdriver/input.cc
Defines the parser and postprocessor for the intermediate output. It is
located relative to the top directory of the groff source tree, e.g.
@GROFFSRCDIR@. This parser is the definitive specification of the groff
intermediate output format.
SEE ALSO
A reference like groff(7) refers to a manual page; here groff in section 7 of the
man-page documentation system. To read the example, look up section 7 in your
desktop help system or call from the shell prompt
shell> man 7 groff
For more details, see man(1).
groff(1)
option -Z and further readings on groff.
groff(7)
for details of the groff language such as numerical units and escape
sequences.
groff_font(5)
for details on the device scaling parameters of the DESC file.
troff(1)
generates the device-independent intermediate output.
roff(7)
for historical aspects and the general structure of roff systems.
groff_diff(7)
The differences between the intermediate output in groff and classical
troff.
grodvi(1), grohtml(1), grolbp(1), grolj4(1), grops(1), grotty(1)
the groff postprocessor programs.
For a treatment of all aspects of the groff system within a single document, see
the groff info file. It can be read within the integrated help systems, within
emacs(1) or from the shell prompt by
shell> info groff
The classical troff output language is described in two AT&T Bell Labs CSTR docu-
ments available on-line at Bell Labs CSTR site 〈http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/
cstr.html〉.
[CSTR #97]
A Typesetter-independent TROFF by Brian Kernighan is the original and most
concise documentation on the output language; see CSTR #97 〈http://
cm.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/cstr/97.ps.gz〉.
[CSTR #54]
The 1992 revision of the Nroff/Troff User’s Manual by J. F. Osanna and Brian
Kernighan isn’t as concise as [CSTR #97] regarding the output language; see
CSTR #54 〈http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/cstr/54.ps.gz〉.
AUTHORS
Copyright (C) 1989, 2001, 2002 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This document is distributed under the terms of the FDL (GNU Free Documentation
License) version 1.1 or later. You should have received a copy of the FDL with
this package; it is also available on-line at the GNU copyleft site 〈http://
www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html〉.
This document is part of groff, the GNU roff distribution. It is based on a former
version - published under the GPL - that described only parts of the groff exten-
sions of the output language. It has been rewritten 2002 by Bernd Warken
〈bwarken AT mayn.de〉 and is maintained by Werner Lemberg 〈wl AT gnu.org〉.
Groff Version 1.18.1.1 12 September 2002 GROFF_OUT(5)
Generated by $Id: phpMan.php,v 4.55 2007/09/05 04:42:51 chedong Exp $ Author: Che Dong
On Apache/1.3.41 (Unix) PHP/5.2.5 mod_perl/1.30 mod_gzip/1.3.26.1a
Under GNU General Public License
2008-12-02 01:24 @38.103.63.58 CrawledBy CCBot/1.0 (+http://www.commoncrawl.org/bot.html)