Re: [Groff] strange if "..."..." behaviour

[Werner LEMBERG]

> > The original troff manual says:
> > 
> >   ... if the strings compare identically (including motions and
> >   character size and font), _anything_ is accepted as input ...
> > 
> > I would interpret this that the comparison is done by a simple
> > strcmp(), and not interpreting the strings.  Can someone please
> > check this with an original AT&T troff?
> 
> No, what it's saying is that the resulting motions, character sizes,
> and fonts have to match, not that the individual motion, size and
> font requests have to match.  In this case ``|'' and ``\fR|\fP''
> both result in a roman ``|'' character with the same point size and
> at the same location on the page, so the strings are equal.  If you
> added a ``.ft I'' before the ``.ie'', then it's false because ``|''
> produces an italic ``|'' rather than a roman one.  AT&T troff works
> exactly the same way.

Thanks for the clarification.  Nevertheless, the wording in the
original troff manual is not ideal.

I'll add a few words to the groff documentation.


    Werner