[Groff] Hygienic mode design

[Eric S. Raymond]

Mike Bianchi <address@hidden>:
> I propose the hygienic feature as a first project after we agree on
> the mission statement.
> 
>         \#      declare all groff macros hygienic, default
>         .hygienic ON   GROFFALL
> 
>         \#      declare all groff macros not hygienic
>         \#      excludes  .hygienic
>         .hygienic OFF  GROFFALL
> 
>         \#      change given macros hygienic modes
>         .hygienic { OFF | ON }  macroname ...
> 
>         .macroset macrosetname  macroname ...          ?
>         .hygienic { OFF | ON }  macrosetname ...       ?
> 
>         \#      set hygienic mode
>         .hygienic { DISABLE | ENABLE }

I had a simpler design in mind.  My premise is that once hygienic mode
has been set we in general don't want or need to unset it, and that's
going to be the very last thing a macro package does.

Thus, all macros and requests start out unhygienic, and:

# Declare macros or requests hygienic
.hygienic name...

# Disable all non-hygienic macros
.hygiene
-- 
                <a href="http://www.catb.org/~esr/";>Eric S. Raymond</a>