GROFF_TMAC(5)GROFF_TMAC(5)NAMEgroff_tmac - macro files in the roff typesetting system
DESCRIPTION
The roff(7) type-setting system provides a set of macro
packages suitable for special kinds of documents. Each
macro package stores its macros and definitions in a file
called the package's tmac file. The name is deduced from
`Troff MACros'.
The tmac files are normal roff source documents, except
that they usually contain only definitions and setup com
mands, but no text. All tmac files are kept in a single
or a small number of directories, the tmac directories.
NAMING
In classical roff systems, there was a funny naming
scheme. If the name of a macro package started with `m'
this letter was omitted, e.g., the macro package for the
man pages man was called an and its macro file tmac.an
(note that in recent versions of groff this file is called
an.tmac instead).
By a similar reasoning, macro packages that did not start
with an `m' were often referred to by adding an `m', e.g.,
the package corresponding to tmac.doc was called mdoc
because the command-line for activating it reads
troff -mdoc.
Actual versions of groff(1) provide both naming schemes
for the inflicted macro packages, with and without the
leading `m'. So in groff, the man macro package may be
specified as
groff -m man,
groff -man,
groff -mman, or
groff -m an.
The easiest way to find out which macro packages are
available on a system is to check the contents of the tmac
directories. For example, a file called tmac.anything or
anything.tmac determines a macro package named anything.
In groff, most macro packages are described in man pages
called groff_<name>(7), with a leading `m' for the classi
cal packages.
INCLUSION
There are several ways to use a macro package in docu
ments. At run-time, the groff option -m name makes the
definitions in the macro file name.tmac available as
described in the section NAMING. If this file isn't
found, tmac.name will be searched.
It is also possible to include the macro file into the
document by using the groff requests .so or .mso. For .so
the full filename of the macro file must be specified --
including the directory where it is kept. If the macro
file is stored in one of the tmac directories it is more
convenient to use .mso instead because it searches the
tmac path for the filename. Additionally, if the file
name to be included has the form name.tmac and it isn't
found, .mso will try to open tmac.name instead and vice
versa.
Note that in order to resolve the .so and .mso requests
the roff preprocessor soelim must be called if the files
to be included needs preprocessing. This can be done
either directly by a pipeline on the command line or by
using the -s option of groff.
You can also supply the letter `s' in the preprocessor
word as described in section CONVENTION.
For example, suppose a macro file is stored as /usr/free_
ware/share/groff/1.17.2/tmac/macros.tmac and is used in
some document called docu.roff.
At run-time, the formatter call for this is
groff -m macros docu.roff
To include the macro file directly in the document either
.mso macros.tmac
is used or
.so /usr/free
ware/share/groff/1.17.2/tmac/macros.tmac
In both cases, the formatter is called with
groff -s docu.roff
CONVENTION
There is a convention that is supported by many modern
roff type-setters: the preprocessor word described in the
following.
If the first line in a document is a comment, the first
word (after the comment characters and a blank) consti
tutes the preprocessor word. That means that the letters
of this word are interpreted as abbreviations for those
preprocessor commands that should be run when formatting
the document. Mostly, only the letters corresponding to
the options for the preprocessors are recognized, `e',
`G', `g', `p', `R', `s', and `t' (see roff(7)).
Besides being a good reminder for the user, some format
ters (like the man(1) program) are even able to automati
cally start the preprocessors specified in the preproces
sor word, but do not bet on this.
WRITING A MACRO FILE
Writing a groff macro file is easy. Design a set of
macros, strings, registers, etc. Store them in a single
file. Documents that use the macros include this macro
file with the .so request as described in the INCLUSION
section.
To use the tmac functionality, call the macro file what_
ever.tmac (or tmac.whatever) and put it in some directory
of the tmac path, cf. section FILES. Then documents can
include it with the .mso request or the groff -m option as
described in the INCLUSION section.
If your macros might be of general usage contact the groff
maintainers to have them included in the groff contrib
source directory.
Some general guidelines might be helpful in writing
macros.
Double all functional backslashes, `\' -> `\\'.
All printable backslashes must be written as `\e'.
Escape all dots, `.' -> `\.'.
Make ample use of the non-printable character `\&' in
text parts, esp. before `\' and at the beginning of a
line, but not before a delayed command.
Use the character `@' in temporary variable names.
Test your macros for text and graphical devices, e.g.,
latin1 and ps.
FILES
All macro names must be named name.tmac or tmac.name to
use the tmac mechanism.
The macro files are kept in the tmac directories, all of
which constitute the tmac path.
The elements of the search path for macro files are (in
that order):
the directories specified with troff's resp. groff's
-M command line option
the directories given in the GROFF_TMAC_PATH environ
ment variable
the current directory (only if in unsafe mode using
the -U command line switch)
the home directory
a site-specific (platform-independent) directory, a
platform-specific directory, and the main tmac direc
tory:
/usr/freeware/share/groff/site-tmac
/usr/freeware/lib/groff/site-tmac
/usr/freeware/share/groff/1.17.2/tmac
ENVIRONMENT
GROFF_TMAC_PATH
A colon separated list of additional tmac directo
ries in which to search for macro files. See the
previous section for a detailed description.
BUGS
The groff documentation is in evolution at the moment. It
is possible that small inconsistencies between different
documents exist temporarily.
AUTHOR
This document is part of groff, the GNU roff distribution.
It was written by Bernd Warken <bwarken@mayn.de>.
It 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 on your system, it is also
available on-line under
<http://www.gnu.org/copyleft/fdl.html>.
SEE ALSO
The authoritative source of information for all details of
the groff system is the groff info(1) file.
For a groff overview, see roff(7) and the file README in
the groff source package.
The groff tmac macro packages are groff_man(7),
groff_mwww(7), groff_mdoc(7), groff_mdoc.samples(7),
groff_me(7), groff_mm(7), groff_mmroff(7), and
groff_ms(7).
The groff language is described in groff(7) and the for
matters in groff(1), troff(1).
The Filesystem Hierarchy Standard (FHS) is available at
http://www.pathname.com/fhs/.
Groff Version 1.17.2 27 June 2001 GROFF_TMAC(5)
