TODO

   1 ************************************************************************
   2 * Official mandoc TODO.
   3 * $Id: TODO,v 1.119 2011/07/09 10:26:57 kristaps Exp $
   4 ************************************************************************
   5
   6 ************************************************************************
   7 * parser bugs
   8 ************************************************************************
   9
  10 - ".\}" on its own line gets translated to bare ".\&"
  11   which forces pset() into man(7)
  12   and then triggers an unknown macro error
  13   reported by naddy@  Sun, 3 Jul 2011 21:52:24 +0200
  14
  15 - .TP before .SH is still FATAL in man(7)
  16   reported by brad@  Sat, 15 Jan 2011 15:54:54 -0500
  17
  18 ************************************************************************
  19 * formatter bugs
  20 ************************************************************************
  21
  22 - tbl(7): Horizontal and vertical lines are formatted badly:
  23   With the box option, there is too much white space at the end of cells.
  24   Horizontal lines from "=" lines are a bit too long.
  25   yuri dot pankov at gmail dot com  Thu, 14 Apr 2011 05:45:26 +0400
  26
  27 ************************************************************************
  28 * missing features
  29 ************************************************************************
  30
  31 --- missing roff features ----------------------------------------------
  32
  33 - .if n \{
  34   .br\}
  35   should cause an extra space to be raised.
  36
  37 - .ad (adjust margins)
  38   .ad l -- adjust left margin only (flush left)
  39   .ad r -- adjust right margin only (flush right)
  40   .ad c -- center text on line
  41   .ad b -- adjust both margins (alias: .ad n)
  42   .na   -- temporarily disable adjustment without changing the mode
  43   .ad   -- re-enable adjustment without changing the mode
  44   Adjustment mode is ignored while in no-fill mode (.nf).
  45
  46 - .it (line traps) occur in mysql(1), yasm_arch(7)
  47   generated by DocBook XSL Stylesheets v1.71.1 <http://docbook.sf.net/>
  48   reported by brad@  Sat, 15 Jan 2011 15:48:18 -0500
  49
  50 - .ns (no-space mode) occurs in xine-config(1)
  51   reported by brad@  Sat, 15 Jan 2011 15:45:23 -0500
  52
  53 - xloadimage(1) wants .ti (temporary indent), rep by naddy@
  54
  55 - .ta (tab settings) occurs in ircbug(1) and probably gnats(1)
  56   reported by brad@  Sat, 15 Jan 2011 15:50:51 -0500
  57
  58 - pod2man expects `tr' to be implemented for \*(-- to work
  59
  60 - \c (interrupted text) occurs in chat(8)
  61
  62 --- missing mdoc features ----------------------------------------------
  63
  64 - fix bad block nesting involving multiple identical explicit blocks
  65   see the OpenBSD mdoc_macro.c 1.47 commit message
  66
  67 - .Bl -column .Xo support is missing
  68   ultimate goal:
  69   restore .Xr and .Dv to
  70   lib/libc/compat-43/sigvec.3
  71   lib/libc/gen/signal.3
  72   lib/libc/sys/sigaction.2
  73
  74 - edge case: decide how to deal with blk_full bad nesting, e.g.
  75   .Sh .Nm .Bk .Nm .Ek .Sh found by jmc@ in ssh-keygen(1)
  76   from jmc@  Wed, 14 Jul 2010 18:10:32 +0100
  77
  78 - \\ is now implemented correctly
  79   * when defining strings and macros using .ds and .de
  80   * when parsing roff(7) and man(7) macro arguments
  81   It does not yet work in mdoc(7) macro arguments
  82   because libmdoc does not yet use mandoc_getarg().
  83   Also check what happens in plain text, it must be identical to \e.
  84
  85 - .Bd -filled should not be the same as .Bd -ragged, but align both
  86   the left and right margin.  In groff, it is implemented in terms
  87   of .ad b, which we don't have either.  Found in cksum(1).
  88
  89 - implement blank `Bl -column', such as
  90   .Bl -column
  91   .It foo Ta bar
  92   .El
  93
  94 - explicitly disallow nested `Bl -column', which would clobber internal
  95   flags defined for struct mdoc_macro
  96
  97 - In .Bl -column .It, the end of the line probably has to be regarded
  98   as an implicit .Ta, if there could be one, see the following mildly
  99   ugly code from login.conf(5):
 100     .Bl -column minpasswordlen program xetcxmotd
 101     .It path Ta path Ta value of Dv _PATH_DEFPATH
 102     .br
 103     Default search path.
 104   reported by Michal Mazurek <akfaew at jasminek dot net>
 105   via jmc@ Thu, 7 Apr 2011 16:00:53 +0059
 106
 107 - inside `.Bl -column' phrases, punctuation is handled like normal
 108   text, e.g. `.Bl -column .It Fl x . Ta ...' should give "-x -."
 109
 110 - inside `.Bl -column' phrases, TERMP_IGNDELIM handling by `Pf'
 111   is not safe, e.g. `.Bl -column .It Pf a b .' gives "ab."
 112   but should give "ab ."
 113
 114 - set a meaningful default if no `Bl' list type is assigned
 115
 116 - have a blank `It' head for `Bl -tag' not puke
 117
 118 - prohibit `Nm' from having non-text HEAD children
 119   (e.g., NetBSD mDNSShared/dns-sd.1)
 120   (mdoc_html.c and mdoc_term.c `Nm' handlers can be slightly simplified)
 121
 122 - When there is free text in the SYNOPSIS and that free text contains
 123   the .Nm macro, groff somehow understands to treat the .Nm as an in-line
 124   macro, while mandoc treats it as a block macro and breaks the line.
 125   No idea how the logic for distinguishing in-line and block instances
 126   should be, needs investigation.
 127   uqs@  Thu, 2 Jun 2011 11:03:51 +0200
 128   uqs@  Thu, 2 Jun 2011 11:33:35 +0200
 129
 130 --- missing man features -----------------------------------------------
 131
 132 - groff an-ext.tmac macros (.UR, .UE) occur in xine(5)
 133   reported by brad@  Sat, 15 Jan 2011 15:45:23 -0500
 134
 135 - -T[x]html doesn't stipulate non-collapsing spaces in literal mode
 136
 137 --- missing tbl features -----------------------------------------------
 138
 139 - implement basic non-parametric .de to support e.g. sox(1)
 140   reported by naddy@ Sat, 16 Oct 2010 23:51:57 +0200
 141   *** sox(1) still doesn't work, tbl(1) errors need investigation
 142
 143 - allow standalone `.' to be interpreted as an end-of-layout
 144   delimiter instead of being thrown away as a no-op roff line
 145   reported by Yuri Pankov, Wed 18 May 2011 11:34:59 CEST
 146
 147 --- missing misc features ----------------------------------------------
 148
 149 - clean up escape sequence handling, creating three classes:
 150   (1) fully implemented, or parsed and ignored without loss of content
 151   (2) unimplemented, potentially causing loss of content
 152       or serious mangling of formatting (e.g. \n) -> ERROR
 153       see textproc/mgdiff(1) for nice examples
 154   (3) undefined, just output the character -> perhaps WARNING
 155
 156 - The \t escape sequence is the same as a literal tab, see for example
 157   the ASCII table in hexdump(1) where
 158     .Bl -column \&000_nu \&001_so \&002_st \&003_et \&004_eo
 159     .It \&000\ nul\t001\ soh\t002\ stx\t003\ etx\t004\ eot\t005\ enq
 160   produces
 161     000 nul  001 soh  002 stx  003 etx  004 eot  005 enq
 162   and the example in oldrdist(1)
 163
 164 - look at pages generated from reStructeredText, e.g. devel/mercurial hg(1)
 165   These are a weird mixture of man(7) and custom autogenerated low-level
 166   roff stuff.  Figure out to what extent we can cope.
 167   For details, see http://docutils.sourceforge.net/rst.html
 168   noted by stsp@  Sat, 24 Apr 2010 09:17:55 +0200
 169   reminded by nicm@  Mon, 3 May 2010 09:52:41 +0100
 170
 171 - check compatibility with Plan9:
 172   http://swtch.com/usr/local/plan9/tmac/tmac.an
 173   http://swtch.com/plan9port/man/man7/man.html
 174   "Anthony J. Bentley" <anthonyjbentley@gmail.com> 28 Dec 2010 21:58:40 -0700
 175
 176 ************************************************************************
 177 * formatting issues: ugly output
 178 ************************************************************************
 179
 180 - a column list with blank `Ta' cells triggers a spurrious
 181   start-with-whitespace printing of a newline
 182
 183 - double quotes inside double quotes are escaped by doubling them
 184   implement this in mdoc(7), too
 185   so far, we only have it in roff(7) and man(7)
 186   reminded by millert@  Thu, 09 Dec 2010 17:29:52 -0500
 187
 188 - perl(1) SYNOPSIS looks bad; reported by deraadt@
 189   1) man(7) seems to need SYNOPSIS .Nm blocks, too
 190
 191 - In .Bl -column,
 192   .It Em Authentication<tab>Key Length
 193   ought to render "Key Length" with emphasis, too,
 194   see OpenBSD iked.conf(5).
 195
 196 - empty phrases in .Bl column produce too few blanks
 197   try e.g. .Bl -column It Ta Ta
 198   reported by millert Fri, 02 Apr 2010 16:13:46 -0400
 199
 200 - .%T can have trailing punctuation.  Currently, it puts the trailing
 201   punctuation into a trailing MDOC_TEXT element inside its own scope.
 202   That element should rather be outside its scope, such that the
 203   punctuation does not get underlines.  This is not trivial to
 204   implement because .%T then needs some features of in_line_eoln() -
 205   slurp all arguments into one single text element - and one feature
 206   of in_line() - put trailing punctuation out of scope.
 207   Found in mount_nfs(8) and exports(5), search for "Appendix".
 208
 209 - in enclosures, mandoc sometimes fancies a bogus end of sentence
 210   reminded by jmc@  Thu, 23 Sep 2010 18:13:39 +0059
 211
 212 ************************************************************************
 213 * formatting issues: gratuitous differences
 214 ************************************************************************
 215
 216 - .Rv (and probably .Ex) print different text if an `Nm' has been named
 217   or not (run a manual without `Nm blah' to see this).  I'm not sure
 218   that this exists in the wild, but it's still an error.
 219
 220 - In .Bl -bullet, the groff bullet is "+\b+\bo\bo", the mandoc bullet
 221   is just "o\bo".
 222   see for example OpenBSD ksh(1)
 223
 224 - The characters "|" and "\*(Ba" should never be bold,
 225   not even in the middle of a word, e.g. ".Cm b\*(Bac" in
 226   "mknod [-m mode] name b|c major minor"
 227   in OpenBSD ksh(1)
 228
 229 - A bogus .Pp between two .It must not produce a double blank line,
 230   see between -R and -r in OpenBSD rm(1), before "update" in mount(8),
 231   or in DIAGNOSTICS in init(8), or before "is always true" in ksh(1).
 232   The same happens with .Pp just before .El, see bgpd.conf(5).
 233   Also have `It' complain if `Pp' is invoked at certain times (not
 234   -compact?).
 235
 236 - .Pp between two .It in .Bl -column should produce one,
 237   not two blank lines, see e.g. login.conf(5).
 238   reported by jmc@  Sun, 17 Apr 2011 14:04:58 +0059
 239
 240 - If the *first* line after .It is .Pp, break the line right after
 241   the tag, do not pad with space characters before breaking.
 242   See the description of the a, c, and i commands in sed(1).
 243
 244 - If the first line after .It is .D1, do not assert a blank line
 245   in between, see for example tmux(1).
 246   reported by nicm@  13 Jan 2011 00:18:57 +0000
 247
 248 - .Nx 1.0a
 249   should be "NetBSD 1.0A", not "NetBSD 1.0a",
 250   see OpenBSD ccdconfig(8).
 251
 252 - In .Bl -tag, if a tag exceeds the right margin and must be continued
 253   on the next line, it must be indented by -width, not width+1;
 254   see "rule block|pass" in OpenBSD ifconfig(8).
 255
 256 - When the -width string contains macros, the macros must be rendered
 257   before measuring the width, for example
 258     .Bl -tag -width ".Dv message"
 259   in magic(5), located in src/usr.bin/file, is the same
 260   as -width 7n, not -width 11n.
 261
 262 - The \& zero-width character counts as output.
 263   That is, when it is alone on a line between two .Pp,
 264   we want three blank lines, not two as in mandoc.
 265
 266 - When .Fn arguments exceed one output line, all but the first
 267   should be indented, see e.g. rpc(3);
 268   reported by jmc@ on discuss@  Fri, 29 Oct 2010 13:48:33 +0100
 269
 270 - .Ns should work when called at the end of an input line, see
 271   the following code in vi(1):
 272     .It Xo
 273     .Op Ar line
 274     .Cm a Ns Op Cm ppend Ns
 275     .Op Cm !\&
 276     .Xc
 277     The input text is appended after the specified line.
 278
 279 - Header lines of excessive length:
 280   Port OpenBSD man_term.c rev. 1.25 to mdoc_term.c
 281   and document it in mdoc(7) and man(7) COMPATIBILITY
 282   found while talking to Chris Bennett
 283
 284 - In man(7), the sequence
 285     .HP
 286     one line of regular text
 287     .SH
 288   should not produce two blank lines before the .SH,
 289   see for example named-checkconf(8).
 290
 291 - In man(7), the sequence
 292     .SH HEADER
 293     <blank line>
 294     .PP
 295     regular text
 296   should not produce any blank lines between the header and the text,
 297   see for example rsync(1).
 298   Reported by naddy@  Mon, 28 Mar 2011 20:45:42 +0200
 299
 300 - In man(7), the sequence
 301     regular text
 302     .IP
 303     .IP "tag"
 304     indented text
 305   should produce one, not four blank lines between the regular text
 306   and the tag, see for example rsync(1).
 307   Likewise,
 308     regular text
 309     .IP
 310     indented text
 311   should produce one, not two blank lines in between, and
 312     regular text
 313     .IP
 314     .RS
 315     .IP tag
 316     indented text
 317   should produce one, not three blank lines.
 318   Reported by naddy@  Mon, 28 Mar 2011 20:45:42 +0200
 319
 320 - trailing whitespace must be ignored even when followed by a font escape,
 321   see for example
 322     makes
 323     \fBdig \fR
 324     operate in batch mode
 325   in dig(1).
 326
 327 ************************************************************************
 328 * error reporting issues
 329 ************************************************************************
 330
 331 ************************************************************************
 332 * performance issues
 333 ************************************************************************
 334
 335 Several areas can be cleaned up to make mandoc even faster.  These are
 336
 337 - improve hashing mechanism for macros (quite important: performance)
 338
 339 - improve hashing mechanism for characters (not as important)
 340
 341 - the PDF file is HUGE: this can be reduced by using relative offsets
 342
 343 - instead of re-initialising the roff predefined-strings set before each
 344   parse, create a read-only version the first time and copy it
 345
 346 ************************************************************************
 347 * structural issues
 348 ************************************************************************
 349
 350 - Find better ways to prevent endless loops
 351   in roff(7) macro and string expansion.
 352
 353 - Finish cleanup of date handling.
 354   Decide which formats should be recognized where.
 355   Update both mdoc(7) and man(7) documentation.
 356   Triggered by  Tim van der Molen  Tue, 22 Feb 2011 20:30:45 +0100