Re: [Groff] groffer.tmac

[Ingo Schwarze]

Hi Bernd,

Bernd Warken wrote on Thu, Jul 03, 2014 at 06:11:49PM +0200:

> I installed a groff file that I will use in several groff based
> man-pages written by me.

This is a very, very bad idea.
Do not gratuitiously extend the man(7) language.
Actually, that has repeatedly been discussed to death already.

> This is the file contrib/groffer/groffer.tmac
> I let it install into the tmacdir.

Over my dead body, at least concerning the OpenBSD port.

I'm more likely to delete groffer(1) - both the program and
the documentation - from the OpenBSD port altogether
than install a dedicated documentation macro package for it.

But i think groffer.tmac is a terrible idea for upstream as well.
Who is going to write properly formatted documentation
if we do not even adhere to our own standards?

> But now I'm not sure, if this position or naming is correct.
> Some idea about the naming and position?

Delete it outright, and fix the formatting of your documentation
to use one of the standard ways, please.  You are free to choose
man(7) or mdoc(7), both are available in any modern groff installation.
You can even use man-ext if you like it (I don't, but opinions
are known to vary about that).

Do not copy your hand-rolled macros into the individual manuals,
either, since that sets an example of very bad practice for manual
authors (i guess even esr might agree with me on that).
Just delete them.

Yours,
  Ingo