From: "Alejandro Colomar (man-pages)" <alx.manpages@gmail.com>
To: "G. Branden Robinson" <g.branden.robinson@gmail.com>
Cc: Michael Kerrisk <mtk.manpages@gmail.com>,
"linux-man@vger.kernel.org" <linux-man@vger.kernel.org>
Subject: Re: nonbreaking spaces (was: [patch] nscd.conf.5: describe reloading, clarifications)
Date: Thu, 29 Jul 2021 16:22:54 +0200 [thread overview]
Message-ID: <90d6fcc8-70e6-5c44-5703-1c2bf2ad6913@gmail.com> (raw)
In-Reply-To: <20210729135829.jpylwkatquhpn53o@localhost.localdomain>
On 7/29/21 3:58 PM, G. Branden Robinson wrote:
> Hi, Alex!
>
> At 2021-07-29T14:18:30+0200, Alejandro Colomar (man-pages) wrote:
>> On 7/29/21 1:55 PM, G. Branden Robinson wrote:
>> Can you provide some examples of rendered output with '\ ' and '\~'?
>> I think I understand it, but a graphical example might be better.
>
> Sure. Here you go.
>
> [[
> demo(1) General Commands Manual demo(1)
>
> Name
> demo - an illustration
>
> Description
> Observe the distinction between the handling of the “\ ” (backslash-
> space) and \^ (backslash-tilde) escapes.
I guess \^ is just a typo and you meant here \~.
>
> Today I was troubleshooting a segmentation fault and had occasion to
> run the “ps -fC troff” command. I also had to run
> “gdb ./build/troff ./build/core”. Here is some filler: XXXXXX
> Mandatory for this illustration is the filling and adjusting of the
> previous line.
>
> nonce 1.0 2021-07-29 demo(1)
> ]]
Yes, that's what I thought you were saying. Thanks for confirming.
>
> In the foregoing, the spaces in "ps -fC troff" do not participate in
> adjustment, which leads to somewhat jarringly large inter-word gaps on
> the rest of the line.
>
>>> It's also, in my opinion, confusing to see and to write and speak
>>> about.
>>
>> I'm not sure I understood this sentence :)
>
> I mean that it "\ " can be difficult to recognize in practice; you
> _have_ to quote it or describe it somehow or the syntactically
> significant space (to roff) gets lots among the regular word-separating
> spaces in prose.
Got it now.
>
>> I'm not sure I understood the difference completely, I'll comment
>> about it when you provide some examples.
>
> Sure. I hope the above helps. Here's the source of the example.
Yes. Well, before seeing the example above, I thought that I preferred
having a single space inside commands, as then the command itself is a
bit more readable. But since that slight increase in readability can
come with a considerable decrease in readability of the surrounding
text, I'm going to accept your proposal.
Would you mind sending a patch for man-pages(7)? :)
Thanks!
Alex
>
> .TH demo 1 2021-07-29 "nonce 1.0"
> .SH Name
> demo \- an illustration
> .SH Description
> Observe the distinction between the handling of the
> .RB \[lq] \[rs]\~ \[rq]
> (backslash-space) and
> .B \[rs]\[ha]
> (backslash-tilde) escapes.
> .P
> Today I was troubleshooting a segmentation fault and had occasion to run
> the
> .RB \[lq] ps\ -fC\ troff \[rq]
> command.
> I also had to run
> .RB \[lq] gdb\~./build/troff\~./build/core \[rq].
> .
> Here is some filler:
> XXXXXX
> \%Mandatory for this illustration is the filling and adjusting of the
> previous line.
>
> Regards,
> Branden
>
--
Alejandro Colomar
Linux man-pages comaintainer; https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/
http://www.alejandro-colomar.es/
next prev parent reply other threads:[~2021-07-29 14:22 UTC|newest]
Thread overview: 10+ messages / expand[flat|nested] mbox.gz Atom feed top
2021-07-27 22:09 [patch] nscd.conf.5: describe reloading, clarifications Greg Banks
2021-07-28 20:31 ` Alejandro Colomar (man-pages)
2021-07-29 11:55 ` nonbreaking spaces (was: [patch] nscd.conf.5: describe reloading, clarifications) G. Branden Robinson
2021-07-29 12:18 ` Alejandro Colomar (man-pages)
2021-07-29 13:58 ` G. Branden Robinson
2021-07-29 14:22 ` Alejandro Colomar (man-pages) [this message]
[not found] ` <BL0PR2101MB1316FA480EE808D34FA523EEA1F09@BL0PR2101MB1316.namprd21.prod.outlook.com>
2021-08-03 8:08 ` [patch] nscd.conf.5: describe reloading, clarifications Alejandro Colomar (man-pages)
[not found] ` <BL0PR2101MB13161815183CB7E6F5D8E61EA1F09@BL0PR2101MB1316.namprd21.prod.outlook.com>
2021-08-04 7:43 ` Alejandro Colomar (man-pages)
[not found] ` <BL0PR2101MB13161650B82F826B74E5DBD0A1F19@BL0PR2101MB1316.namprd21.prod.outlook.com>
2021-08-05 6:58 ` Alejandro Colomar (man-pages)
2021-08-05 7:38 ` G. Branden Robinson
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