Re: [Groff] Additional information od .do-page wierdness

[Jon Snader]

On Tue, Oct 01, 2002 at 12:32:23AM -0500, Michael Hobgood wrote:
> Jon,
>       While working with Chapter 1, I discovered that
> the movement is not limited to just the line under
> the chapter title.  Instead, anytime you have a .page xxx
> followed by a .Se or .Ah or .Bh, the title/section heading
> will move upward.  But, if there is any intervening text at
> all between the .page xxx line and the .Se/.Ah/.Bh line,
> no incorrect movement occurs.
> 
> ie this produces the movement:
> .page xxx
> .Ah "Unix Text Processing"
> 
> while this would not:
> .page xxx
> to be continued in chapter 3.
> .Ah "Unix Text Processing"
> 

This is just an artifact of the way that the .page macro works.
When called, .page remembers its vertical position, diverts its
argument, outputs the current line, returns to the saved position,
and finally outputs the .page argument.

The problem occurs because .Se spaces down 6 points after setting
the chapter heading.  After the .page macro returns to the starting
position and outputs its argument, the 6p spacing is lost.

Those who enjoy pain, and want to see what's going on should take
a look at the .page macro.  I don't think it's worth the effort to
try to fix this.  Just put the .page macro *after* the .Se, etc.
and it will be OK.  The page output will move down to the first line
of the page, but I don't think that's too much of a problem.

BTW, this will happen anytime the current line is followed
by spacing.  That is, the following:

        .page 123
        Here is some text.
        .sp 5
        More text.

produces:

    123 Here is some text.
            More text.

If anyone thinks this is a real problem, let me know and I'll spend a
little more time on it.

Jon Snader