[Groff] Grops: hex strings in output

[Ted Harding]

Hi Folks,

Now using groff 1.18.1, and in passing probing for clues about
the ps2pdf problem I mailed about earlier, I had a look in the
PS file produced by groff (grops).

I noticed that grops output now presents text as PostScript
"hexadecimal" strings. E.g.

  This is text

is output as

  <54686973206973207465>72 84 Q<7874>-.15 E

rather than the usual

  (This is te)72 84 Q(xt)-.15 E

as it used to be.

This change must have passed me by -- it's the first time I've
noticed it! However, I'd like to ask what was the motive for
introducing this change. Although equivalent in effect, it does
make the PS file almost unreadable for anyone (like me) who does
occasionally tweak a file, or (more often) may search through it
for a sequence of characters when looking for a clue about some
problem which shows up when the PS file is printed.

It also makes bigger files.

In fact I'm not sure that I see the point of the change!

Any comments welcome,
Ted.




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E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <address@hidden>
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Date: 28-Sep-03                                       Time: 20:11:55
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