Re: 'man groff' reports end of file while defining macro `TP'

[Werner LEMBERG]

> /opt/reb/share/man/man1/groff.1:57: error: end of file while defining macro 
> `TP'
> troff: warning: numeric expression expected (got `\')
>
> SUGGESTED FIX [optional]:
>
> I tried renaming the "TP+" macro to "Tq", and this changed the error
> message to talk about the macro "Te", so I'm lost.  Perhaps it's a
> bug in groff itself, rather than in the macros?

groff is called in compatibility mode.  This is caused by the wrapper
files for Sun's troff macro packages which explicitly call `.cp 1'.

It's not easy to solve this problem.  Some suggestions:

1. Install groff with

    make install tmac_wrap=""

   to use groff's macro packages instead of Sun's.  Then the extended
   groff syntax is the default, and man pages using the old troff
   syntax (this is, no whitespace between a two-character command and
   its first argument) can be handled by adding groff's -C command
   line switch to activate compatibility mode on demand.

2. Surround all man pages which actually use long macro names with

     .nr _C \n(.C
     .cp 0

     <man page>

     .cp \n[_C]

   to switch off compatibility mode while processing the man page with
   Sun's man macros.  This might still cause failures since groff's
   man package is more powerful; for example, it can handle an
   arbitrary number of arguments to .B and friends (and some groff man
   pages actually use this).

3. Filter all man pages through the `fixmacros.sed' script (which
   comes with groff) and avoid the use of wrapper files so that
   groff's macro files are input.

4. Write a small script which tests the location of the man page.  If
   it is in the `local' tree, -mgan should be used and -man
   otherwise.


I like item 3 most, but I don't know how reliable the fixmacros.sed
script is (I think it should be OK for man pages which are assumed to
not use weird troff features).


    Werner