GROG(1) General Commands Manual GROG(1)
NAME
grog - guess options for a following groff command
SYNOPSIS
grog [-C] [-T device] [--run] [--warnings] [--ligatures] [groff-option
...] [--] [filespec ...]
grog -h
grog --help
grog -v
grog --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. A suitable device is now always written as -Tdevice including
the groff default as -T ps.
The corresponding groff command is usually displayed in standard out-
put. With the option --run, the generated line is output into standard
error and the generated groff command is run on the standard output.
groffer(1) relies on a perfectly running groff(1).
OPTIONS
The option -v or --version prints information on the version number.
Also -h or --help prints usage information. Both of these options au-
tomatically 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 er-
ror.
All other specified short options (words starting with one minus char-
acter -) are interpreted as groff options or option clusters with or
without argument. No space is allowed between options and their argu-
ment. 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, -p, -R, -s, -t (preprocessors); and -man, -mdoc,
-mdoc-old, -me, -mm, -mom, and -ms (macro packages).
The guessed groff command including those options and the found file-
spec 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 op-
tions.
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 pack-
age. 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.
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 with-
out any interface to grog. These are the option cluster -ksS consist-
ing 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.
AUTHORS
grog was originally written by James Clark. The current Perl implemen-
tation was written by Bernd Warken <groff-bernd.warken-72@web.de> with
contributions from Ralph Corderoy, and is maintained by Werner Lemberg
<wl@gnu.org>.
SEE ALSO
groff(1), groffer(1)
groff 1.22.4 6 May 2020 GROG(1)