Re: [Groff] Converting basic units to inches in PostScript

[Larry Kollar]

> Damian McGuckin <address@hidden> wrote:
> 
> On Wed, 3 Aug 2016, Larry Kollar wrote:
> 
>> Is there some reason you can?t use device-independent units like inches or 
>> ens?
>> 
>> .in 1i \? One inch indent on all devices
>> .in 6n \? Six ens, (1 en is roughly the current text size)
> 
> Sadly, I was under the 35 year impression you could. But in my letterhead
> where I use
> 
>       .ti +5i
> 
> to offset the date, I realised nroff/groff(tty) and troff/groff(a4) are
> only approximately correct.

I can see that with tty, given the resolution it has to work with. But what 
drivers are you using for troff/groff? I’m formatting paperbacks and haven’t 
run into any issues so far.

Printers also have some slop. Run the same page through twice and you’ll see 
what I mean. If you’re trying to position something on letterhead with very 
little margin for error, I could see where that would be a problem as well.

— Larry