grog - Online in the Cloud

PROGRAM:

NAME

grog — guess options for a following groff command

SYNOPSIS

grog [-C] [--run] [--warnings] [--ligatures] [ groff-option ....] [--] [ filespec ....]
grog -h | --help
grog -v | --version

DESCRIPTION

grog reads the input (file names or standard input) and guesses which of the groff(1)
options are needed to perform the input with the groff program.

The corresponding groff command is usually displayed in standard output. With the
option --run, the generated line is output into standard error and the generated
groff command is run on the standard output.

OPTIONS

The option -v or --version prints information on the version number. Also -h or --help
prints usage information. Both of these options automatically end the grog program.
Other options are thenignored, and no groff command line is generated. The following 3
options are the only grog options,

-C this option means enabling the groff compatibility mode, which is also transfered
to the generated groff command line.

--ligatures
this option forces to include the arguments -P-y -PU within the generated groff
command line.

--run with this option, the command line is output at standard error and then run on the
computer.

--warnings
with this option, some more warnings are output to standard error.

All other specified short options (words starting with one minus character -) are
interpreted as groff options or option clusters with or without argument. No space is
allowed between options and their argument. Except from the -marg options, all options
will be passed on, i.e. they are included unchanged in the command for the output without
effecting the work of grog.

A filespec argument can either be the name of an existing file or a single minus - to mean
standard input. If no filespec is specified standard input is read automatically.

DETAILS

grog reads all filespec parameters as a whole. It tries to guess which of the following
groff options are required for running the input under groff: -e, -g, -G, -j, -J, -p, -R,
-s, -t. -man, -mdoc, -mdoc-old, -me, -mm, -mom, and -ms.

The guessed groff command including those options and the found filespec parameters is put
on the standard output.

It is possible to specify arbitrary groff options on the command line. These are passed
on the output without change, except for the -marg options.

The groff program has trouble when the wrong -marg option or several of these options are
specified. In these cases, grog will print an error message and exit with an error code.
It is better to specify no -marg option. Because such an option is only accepted and
passed when grog does not find any of these options or the same option is found.

If several different -marg options are found by grog an error message is produced and the
program is terminated with an error code. But the output is written with the wrong
options nevertheless.

Remember that it is not necessary to determine a macro package. A roff file can also be
written in the groff language without any macro package. grog will produce an output
without an -marg option.

As groff also works with pure text files without any roff requests, grog cannot be used to
identify a file to be a roff file.

The groffer(1) program heavily depends on a working grog.

The grog source contains two files written in different programming languages: grog.pl is
the Perl version, while grog.sh is a shell script using awk(1). During the run of
make(1), it is determined whether the system contains a suitable version of perl(1). If
so, grog.pl is transformed into grog; otherwise grog.sh is used instead.

EXAMPLES

* Calling

grog meintro.me

results in

groff -me meintro.me

So grog recognized that the file meintro.me is written with the -me macro package.

* On the other hand,

grog pic.ms

outputs

groff -p -t -e -ms pic.ms

Besides determining the macro package -ms, grog recognized that the file pic.ms
additionally needs -pte, the combination of -p for pic, -t for tbl, and -e for eqn.

* If both of the former example files are combined by the command

grog meintro.me pic.ms

an error message is sent to standard error because groff cannot work with two different
macro packages:

grog: error: there are several macro packages: -me -ms

Additionally the corresponding output with the wrong options is printed to standard
output:

groff -pte -me -ms meintro.me pic.ms

But the program is terminated with an error code.

* The call of

grog -ksS -Tdvi grnexmpl.g

contains several groff options that are just passed on the output without any interface
to grog. These are the option cluster -ksS consisting of -k, -s, and -S; and the option
-T with argument dvi. The output is

groff -k -s -S -Tdvi grnexmpl.g

so no additional option was added by grog. As no option -marg was found by grog this
file does not use a macro package.

Use grog online using onworks.net services