index.sgml

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   6                 <TITLE>mdocml | UNIX manpage compiler</TITLE>
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  10                         <B>mdocml</B> &#8211; UNIX manpage compiler, current version @VERSION@ (@VDATE@)
  11                 </P>
  12                 <P CLASS="subhead">
  13                         Sources: <A HREF="/snapshots/mdocml.tar.gz">current</A>,
  14                         <A HREF="/cgi-bin/cvsweb/?cvsroot=mdocml">cvsweb</A>
  15                         (<A HREF="/snapshots/">archives</A>)
  16                 </P>
  17                 <H1>
  18                         <A NAME="description">Description</A>
  19                 </H1>
  20                 <P>
  21                         <SPAN CLASS="nm">mdocml</SPAN> is a suite of tools compiling <I><A HREF="mdoc.7.html">mdoc</A></I>, the roff macro
  22                         package of choice for BSD manual pages, and <I><A HREF="man.7.html">man</A></I>, the predominant historical package for
  23                         UNIX manuals.  The mission of <SPAN CLASS="nm">mdocml</SPAN> is to deprecate <A
  24                         HREF="http://www.gnu.org/software/groff/" CLASS="external">groff</A>, the GNU troff implementation, for displaying <I>mdoc</I>
  25                         pages whilst providing token support for <I>man</I>.
  26                 </P>
  27                 <P>
  28                         Why?  groff amounts to over 5 MB of source code, most of which is C++ and GPL version 3.  It runs slowly, produces
  29                         uncertain output, and varies in operation from system to system.  mdocml strives to fix this (respectively small, C, <A
  30                         CLASS="external" HREF="http://www.isc.org/software/license">ISC</A>-licensed, fast and regular).
  31                 </P>
  32                 <P>
  33                         <SPAN CLASS="nm">mdocml</SPAN> consists of the <A HREF="mandoc.3.html">libmandoc</A> validating compiler and <A
  34                         HREF="mandoc.1.html">mandoc</A>, which interfaces with the compiler library to format output for UNIX terminals (with
  35                         support for wide-character locales), XHTML, HTML, PostScript, and PDF.
  36                         It also includes <A HREF="preconv.1.html">preconv</A> for recoding multibyte manuals,
  37                         <A HREF="demandoc.1.html">demandoc</A> for emitting only text parts of manuals,
  38                         <A HREF="mandocdb.8.html">mandocdb</A> for indexing manuals,
  39                         <A HREF="apropos.1.html">apropos</A> (includes whatis mode) for indexed manual search, and
  40                         <A HREF="man.cgi.7.html">man.cgi</A> for indexed manual search online.
  41                         It is a <A CLASS="external" HREF="http://bsd.lv/">BSD.lv</A> project.
  42                 </P>
  43                 <P>
  44                         <I>Disambiguation</I>: <SPAN CLASS="nm">mdocml</SPAN> is often referred to by its installed binary, <Q>mandoc</Q>.
  45                 </P>
  46                 <H2>
  47                         <A NAME="sources">Sources</A>
  48                 </H2>
  49                 <P>
  50                         <SPAN CLASS="nm">mdocml</SPAN> is in ISO C99 and should build and run on any modern system; however, you'll need <A
  51                         HREF="http://www.sqlite.org">sqlite3</A> to build <A HREF="apropos.1.html">apropos</A> (links to whatis),
  52                         <A HREF="man.cgi.7.html">man.cgi</A>, and <A HREF="mandocdb.8.html">mandocdb</A>.
  53                         To build and install into <I>/usr/local/</I>, just run <CODE>make install</CODE>.
  54                         Be careful: the <B>preconv</B>, <B>apropos</B>, and <B>whatis</B> binary names are usually taken by existing utilities.
  55                 </P>
  56                 <H2>
  57                         Downstream
  58                 </H2>
  59                 <P>
  60                         Several systems come bundled with <SPAN CLASS="nm">mdocml</SPAN> utilities.
  61                         If your system does not appear below, the maintainers have not contacted me and it should not be considered
  62                         <Q>official</Q>.
  63                         Please <A HREF="#contact">contact us</A> if you plan on maintaining a downstream version!
  64                 </P>
  65                 <TABLE WIDTH="100%" SUMMARY="Downstream Sources">
  66                         <COL WIDTH="175">
  67                         <COL>
  68                         <TBODY>
  69                                 <TR>
  70                                         <TD>DragonFly BSD</TD>
  71                                         <TD>
  72                                         <A HREF="http://gitweb.dragonflybsd.org/dragonfly.git/tree/HEAD:/contrib/mdocml" CLASS="external">contrib/mdocml</A> (1.12.1 sources)
  73                                         <A HREF="http://gitweb.dragonflybsd.org/dragonfly.git/tree/HEAD:/lib/libmandoc" CLASS="external">lib/libmandoc</A>
  74                                         <A HREF="http://gitweb.dragonflybsd.org/dragonfly.git/tree/HEAD:/usr.bin/mandoc" CLASS="external">usr.bin/mandoc</A> (build system)
  75                                         </TD>
  76                                 </TR>
  77                                 <TR>
  78                                         <TD>FreeBSD 10.0, -CURRENT</TD>
  79                                         <TD>
  80                                         <A HREF="http://svnweb.freebsd.org/base/head/contrib/mdocml/" CLASS="external">contrib/mdocml</A> (1.12.1 sources)
  81                                         <A HREF="http://svnweb.freebsd.org/base/head/usr.bin/mandoc/" CLASS="external">usr.bin/mandoc</A> (build system)
  82                                         </TD>
  83                                 </TR>
  84                                 <TR>
  85                                         <TD>FreeBSD 9.x, 8.x</TD>
  86                                         <TD>
  87                                         <A HREF="http://svnweb.freebsd.org/ports/head/textproc/mdocml/" CLASS="external">ports/textproc/mdocml</A> (1.12.1 port)
  88                                         </TD>
  89                                 </TR>
  90                                 <TR>
  91                                         <TD>NetBSD</TD>
  92                                         <TD>
  93                                         <A HREF="http://cvsweb.netbsd.org/bsdweb.cgi/src/external/bsd/mdocml/" CLASS="external">src/external/bsd/mdocml</A> (1.12.1 sources plus patches and build system)
  94                                         </TD>
  95                                 </TR>
  96                                 <TR>
  97                                         <TD>OpenBSD</TD>
  98                                         <TD>
  99                                         <A HREF="http://www.openbsd.org/cgi-bin/cvsweb/src/usr.bin/mandoc/" CLASS="external">src/usr.bin/mandoc</A> (1.12.2 sources and build system)
 100                                         </TD>
 101                                 </TR>
 102                                 <TR>
 103                                         <TD>pkgsrc</TD>
 104                                         <TD>
 105                                         <A HREF="http://pkgsrc.se/textproc/mdocml" CLASS="external">textproc/mdocml</A> (1.12.2 port)
 106                                         </TD>
 107                                 </TR>
 108                                 <TR>
 109                                         <TD>Minix3</TD>
 110                                         <TD>
 111                                         <A HREF="http://git.minix3.org/?p=minix.git;a=tree;f=external/bsd/mdocml" CLASS="external">external/bsd/mdocml</A> (1.10.9 sources and build system)
 112                                         </TD>
 113                                 </TR>
 114                                 <TR>
 115                                         <TD>Alpine Linux</TD>
 116                                         <TD>
 117                                         <A HREF="http://git.alpinelinux.org/cgit/aports/tree/main/mdocml" CLASS="external">aports/main/mdocml</A> (1.12.1 port)
 118                                         </TD>
 119                                 </TR>
 120                         </TBODY>
 121                 </TABLE>
 122                 <H1>
 123                         <A NAME="documentation">Documentation</A>
 124                 </H1>
 125                 <P>
 126                         These manuals are generated automatically and refer to the current release.
 127                         They are the authoritative documentation for the <SPAN CLASS="nm">mdocml</SPAN> system.
 128                 </P>
 129
 130                 <TABLE WIDTH="100%" SUMMARY="Documentation">
 131                         <COL WIDTH="175">
 132                         <COL>
 133                         <TBODY>
 134                                 <TR>
 135                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="apropos.1.html">apropos(1)</A></TD>
 136                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 137                                                 search the manual page database
 138                                         </TD>
 139                                 </TR>
 140                                 <TR>
 141                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="demandoc.1.html">demandoc(1)</A></TD>
 142                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 143                                                 emit only text of UNIX manuals
 144                                         </TD>
 145                                 </TR>
 146                                 <TR>
 147                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="mandoc.1.html">mandoc(1)</A></TD>
 148                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 149                                                 format and display UNIX manuals
 150                                         </TD>
 151                                 </TR>
 152                                 <TR>
 153                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="preconv.1.html">preconv(1)</A></TD>
 154                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 155                                                 recode multibyte UNIX manuals
 156                                         </TD>
 157                                 </TR>
 158                                 <TR>
 159                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="mandoc.3.html">mandoc(3)</A></TD>
 160                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 161                                                 mandoc macro compiler library
 162                                         </TD>
 163                                 </TR>
 164                                 <TR>
 165                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="tbl.3.html">tbl(3)</A></TD>
 166                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 167                                                 roff table parser library for mandoc
 168                                         </TD>
 169                                 </TR>
 170                                 <TR>
 171                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="eqn.7.html">eqn(7)</A></TD>
 172                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 173                                                 eqn-mandoc language reference
 174                                         </TD>
 175                                 </TR>
 176                                 <TR>
 177                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="man.7.html">man(7)</A></TD>
 178                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 179                                                 man language reference
 180                                         </TD>
 181                                 </TR>
 182                                 <TR>
 183                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="man.cgi.7.html">man.cgi(7)</A></TD>
 184                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 185                                                 cgi for manpage query and display
 186                                         </TD>
 187                                 </TR>
 188                                 <TR>
 189                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="mandoc_char.7.html">mandoc_char(7)</A></TD>
 190                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 191                                                 mandoc special characters
 192                                         </TD>
 193                                 </TR>
 194                                 <TR>
 195                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="mdoc.7.html">mdoc(7)</A></TD>
 196                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 197                                                 mdoc language reference
 198                                         </TD>
 199                                 </TR>
 200                                 <TR>
 201                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="roff.7.html">roff(7)</A></TD>
 202                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 203                                                 roff-mandoc language reference
 204                                         </TD>
 205                                 </TR>
 206                                 <TR>
 207                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="tbl.7.html">tbl(7)</A></TD>
 208                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 209                                                 tbl-mandoc language reference
 210                                         </TD>
 211                                 </TR>
 212                                 <TR>
 213                                         <TD VALIGN="top"><A HREF="mandocdb.8.html">mandocdb(8)</A></TD>
 214                                         <TD VALIGN="top">
 215                                                 index UNIX manuals
 216                                         </TD>
 217                                 </TR>
 218                         </TBODY>
 219                 </TABLE>
 220                 <H1>
 221                         <A NAME="contact">Contact</A>
 222                 </H1>
 223                 <P>
 224                         Use the mailing lists for bug-reports, patches, questions, etc.  Please check the
 225                         <A HREF="http://mdocml.bsd.lv/cgi-bin/cvsweb/TODO?cvsroot=mdocml">TODO</A> for known issues
 226                         before posting.  All lists are subscription-only: send a blank e-mail to the listed address to subscribe.  Beyond that,
 227                         contact Kristaps at <A HREF="http://mailhide.recaptcha.net/d?k=01M6h_w7twDp58ZgH57eWC_w==&amp;c=Q2DBUt401ePlSeupJFrq_Q==" TITLE="Reveal
 228                         this e-mail address">kris...</A>@bsd.lv.  Archives are available at <A HREF="http://gmane.org/" CLASS="external">Gmane</A>.
 229                 </P>
 230                 <TABLE WIDTH="100%" SUMMARY="Mailing Lists">
 231                         <COL WIDTH="175">
 232                         <COL>
 233                         <TBODY>
 234                                 <TR>
 235                                         <TD>
 236                                                 disc<A CLASS="external" TITLE="Reveal this e-mail address"
 237                                                 HREF="http://www.google.com/recaptcha/mailhide/d?k=01KQ80PFH5n3BBNpF5Gs4sRg==&amp;c=EV1QytpQqTHSItc2IXvZyocgYLPnG5K0JKw_gwMC9yc=">...</A>@mdocml.bsd.lv
 238                                         </TD>
 239                                         <TD>
 240                                                 bug-reports, general questions, and announcements
 241                                         </TD>
 242                                 </TR>
 243                                 <TR>
 244                                         <TD>
 245                                                 tec<A CLASS="external" TITLE="Reveal this e-mail address"
 246                                                 HREF="http://www.google.com/recaptcha/mailhide/d?k=01qDX_iV0RlUOarEvb6mR28g==&amp;c=gRXsTjza0NNCFPaYu-Taj2tF0pmYZSc90EZkFkhkxgo=">...</A>@mdocml.bsd.lv
 247                                         </TD>
 248                                         <TD>
 249                                                 patches and system discussions
 250                                         </TD>
 251                                 </TR>
 252                                 <TR>
 253                                         <TD>
 254                                                 sou<A CLASS="external" TITLE="Reveal this e-mail address"
 255                                                 HREF="http://www.google.com/recaptcha/mailhide/d?k=01prQrAZhhl2EbIwVcRfABsQ==&amp;c=KtTW4Yic9xk-8g40KzJoca4fR3MYXv28g8NC6OQV-T8=">...</A>@mdocml.bsd.lv
 256                                         </TD>
 257                                         <TD>
 258                                                 source commit messages
 259                                         </TD>
 260                                 </TR>
 261                         </TBODY>
 262                 </TABLE>
 263                 <H1>
 264                         <A NAME="news">News</A>
 265                 </H1>
 266                 <P CLASS="news">
 267                         xx-xx-2013: version 1.13.0
 268                 </P>
 269                 <P>
 270                          The <A HREF="mandocdb.8.html">mandocdb</A> tools (<A HREF="mandocdb.8.html">mandocdb</A>, <A
 271                         HREF="apropos.1.html">apropos</A> (absorbing whatis), and <A HREF="man.cgi.7.html">man.cgi</A>) have been re-written to
 272                         use <A CLASS="external" HREF="http://www.sqlite.org">sqlite3</A> as a database.
 273                 </P>
 274                 <P CLASS="news">
 275                         05-10-2013: version 1.12.2
 276                 </P>
 277                 <P>
 278                         The <A HREF="mdoc.7.html">mdoc(7)</A> to <A HREF="man.7.html">man(7)</A> converter,
 279                         to be called as <CODE>mandoc -Tman</CODE>, is now fully functional.
 280                 </P>
 281                 <P>
 282                         The <A HREF="mandoc.1.html">mandoc(1)</A> utility now supports the <CODE>-Ios</CODE> (default operating system)
 283                         input option, and the <CODE>-Tutf8</CODE> output mode now actually works.
 284                 </P>
 285                 <P>
 286                         The <A HREF="mandocdb.8.html">mandocdb(8)</A> utility no longer truncates existing databases when starting to build new ones,
 287                         but only replaces them when the build actually succeeds.
 288                 </P>
 289                 <P>
 290                         The <A HREF="man.7.html">man(7)</A> parser now supports the <EM>PD</EM> macro (paragraph distance),
 291                         and (for GNU man-ext compatibility only) <EM>EX</EM> (example block) and <EM>EE</EM> (example end).
 292                         Plus several bugfixes regarding indentation, line breaks, and vertical spacing,
 293                         and regarding <EM>RS</EM> following <EM>TP</EM>.
 294                 </P>
 295                 <P>
 296                         The <A HREF="roff.7.html">roff(7)</A> parser now supports the <EM>\f(BI</EM> (bold+italic) font escape,
 297                         the <EM>\z</EM> (zero cursor advance) escape and the <EM>cc</EM> (change control character)
 298                         and <EM>it</EM> (input line trap) requests.
 299                         Plus bugfixes regarding the <EM>\t</EM> (tab) escape, nested escape sequences, and conditional requests.
 300                 </P>
 301                 <P>
 302                         In <A HREF="mdoc.7.html">mdoc(7)</A>, several bugs were fixed related to UTF-8 output of quoting enclosures,
 303                         delimiter handling, list indentation and horizontal and vertical spacing,
 304                         formatting of the <EM>Lk</EM>, <EM>%U</EM>, and <EM>%C</EM> macros,
 305                         plus some bugfixes related to the handling of syntax errors like badly nested font blocks,
 306                         stray <EM>Ta</EM> macros outside column lists, unterminated <EM>It Xo</EM> blocks,
 307                         and non-text children of <EM>Nm</EM> blocks.
 308                 </P>
 309                 <P>
 310                         In <A HREF="tbl.7.html">tbl(7)</A>, the width of horizontal spans and the vertical spacing around tables was corrected,
 311                         and in <A HREF="man.7.html">man(7)</A> files, a crash was fixed that was triggered by some particular unclosed <EM>T{</EM> macros.
 312                 </P>
 313                 <P>
 314                         For mandoc developers, we now provide a <A HREF="tbl.3.html">tbl(3)</A> library manual and <CODE>gmdiff</CODE>,
 315                         a very small, very simplistic groff-versus-mandoc output comparison tool.
 316                 </P>
 317                 <P>
 318                         See <A HREF="NEWS">NEWS</A> for historical notes.
 319                 </P>
 320                 <P CLASS="news">
 321                         23-03-2012: version 1.12.1
 322                 </P>
 323                 <P>
 324                         Significant work on <A HREF="apropos.1.html">apropos</A> and <A HREF="mandocdb.8.html">mandocdb</A>.  These tools are
 325                         now much more robust.
 326                         A <A HREF="whatis.1.html">whatis</A> implementation is now handled as an <A HREF="apropos.1.html">apropos</A> mode.
 327                         These tools are also able to minimally handle pre-formatted pages, that is, those already formatted by another utility
 328                         such as GNU troff.
 329                 </P>
 330                 <P>
 331                         The <A HREF="man.cgi.7.html">man.cgi</A> script is also now available for wider testing.  It interfaces with <A
 332                         HREF="mandocdb.8.html">mandocdb</A> manuals cached by <A HREF="catman.8.html">catman</A>.  HTML output is generated
 333                         on-the-fly by <A HREF="mandoc.3.html">libmandoc</A> or internal methods to convert pre-formatted pages.
 334                 </P>
 335                 <P>
 336                         The mailing list archive for the discuss and tech lists are being hosted by <A CLASS="external"
 337                         HREF="http://www.gmane.org">Gmane</A> at <A HREF="http://dir.gmane.org/gmane.comp.tools.mdocml.user"
 338                         CLASS="external">gmane.comp.tools.mdocml.user</A> and <A HREF="http://dir.gmane.org/gmane.comp.tools.mdocml.devel"
 339                         CLASS="external">gmane.comp.tools.mdocml.devel</A>, respectively.
 340                 </P>
 341                 <P>
 342                         Lastly, I'm no longer providing binaries, as nobody has asked for them.
 343                 </P>
 344                 <P>
 345                         See <A HREF="http://mdocml.bsd.lv/cgi-bin/cvsweb/index.sgml?cvsroot=mdocml">cvsweb</A> for
 346                         historical notes.
 347                 </P>
 348                 <P CLASS="foot">
 349                         <SMALL>
 350                                 Copyright &#169; 2008&#8211;2011
 351                                 <A CLASS="external" HREF="http://kristaps.bsd.lv">Kristaps Dzonsons</A>,
 352                                 &#169; 2013 Ingo Schwarze,
 353                                 $Date: 2013/10/05 20:09:24 $
 354                         </SMALL>
 355                 </P>
 356         </BODY>
 357 </HTML>