+for a complete list.
+.Ss Text Decoration
+Terms may be text-decorated using the
+.Sq \ef
+escape followed by an indicator: B (bold), I (italic), R (regular), or P
+(revert to previous mode).
+A numerical representation 3, 2, or 1 (bold, italic, and regular,
+respectively) may be used instead.
+The indicator or numerical representative may be preceded by C
+(constant-width), which is ignored.
+.Pp
+Examples:
+.Bl -tag -width Ds -offset indent -compact
+.It Li \efBbold\efR
+Write in bold, then switch to regular font mode.
+.It Li \efIitalic\efP
+Write in italic, then return to previous font mode.
+.El
+.Pp
+Text decoration is
+.Em not
+recommended for
+.Xr mdoc 7 ,
+which encourages semantic annotation.
+.Ss Predefined Strings
+Predefined strings, like
+.Sx Special Characters ,
+mark special output glyphs.
+Predefined strings are escaped with the slash-asterisk,
+.Sq \e* :
+single-character
+.Sq \e*X ,
+two-character
+.Sq \e*(XX ,
+and N-character
+.Sq \e*[N] .
+.Pp
+Examples:
+.Bl -tag -width Ds -offset indent -compact
+.It Li \e*(Am
+Two-letter ampersand predefined string.
+.It Li \e*q
+One-letter double-quote predefined string.
+.El
+.Pp
+Predefined strings are not recommended for use,
+as they differ across implementations.
+Those supported by
+.Xr mandoc 1
+are listed in
+.Xr mandoc_char 7 .
+Manuals using these predefined strings are almost certainly not portable.
+.Ss Whitespace
+Whitespace consists of the space character.
+In text lines, whitespace is preserved within a line.
+In request and macro lines, whitespace delimits arguments and is discarded.
+.Pp
+Unescaped trailing spaces are stripped from text line input unless in a
+literal context.
+In general, trailing whitespace on any input line is discouraged for
+reasons of portability.
+In the rare case that a blank character is needed at the end of an
+input line, it may be forced by
+.Sq \e\ \e& .
+.Pp
+Literal space characters can be produced in the output
+using escape sequences.
+In macro lines, they can also be included in arguments using quotation; see
+.Sx MACRO SYNTAX
+for details.
+.Pp
+Blank text lines, which may include whitespace, are only permitted
+within literal contexts.
+If the first character of a text line is a space, that line is printed
+with a leading newline.
+.Ss Scaling Widths
+Many requests and macros support scaled widths for their arguments.
+The syntax for a scaled width is
+.Sq Li [+-]?[0-9]*.[0-9]*[:unit:] ,
+where a decimal must be preceded or followed by at least one digit.
+Negative numbers, while accepted, are truncated to zero.
+.Pp
+The following scaling units are accepted:
+.Pp
+.Bl -tag -width Ds -offset indent -compact
+.It c
+centimetre
+.It i
+inch
+.It P
+pica (~1/6 inch)
+.It p
+point (~1/72 inch)
+.It f
+synonym for
+.Sq u
+.It v
+default vertical span
+.It m
+width of rendered
+.Sq m
+.Pq em
+character
+.It n
+width of rendered
+.Sq n
+.Pq en
+character
+.It u
+default horizontal span
+.It M
+mini-em (~1/100 em)
+.El
+.Pp
+Using anything other than
+.Sq m ,
+.Sq n ,
+.Sq u ,
+or
+.Sq v
+is necessarily non-portable across output media.
+See
+.Sx COMPATIBILITY .
+.Pp
+If a scaling unit is not provided, the numerical value is interpreted
+under the default rules of
+.Sq v
+for vertical spaces and
+.Sq u
+for horizontal ones.
+.Pp
+Examples:
+.Bl -tag -width ".Bl -tag -width 2i" -offset indent -compact
+.It Li \&.Bl -tag -width 2i
+two-inch tagged list indentation in
+.Xr mdoc 7
+.It Li \&.HP 2i
+two-inch tagged list indentation in
+.Xr man 7
+.It Li \&.sp 2v
+two vertical spaces
+.El
+.Ss Sentence Spacing
+Each sentence should terminate at the end of an input line.
+By doing this, a formatter will be able to apply the proper amount of
+spacing after the end of sentence (unescaped) period, exclamation mark,
+or question mark followed by zero or more non-sentence closing
+delimiters
+.Po
+.Sq \&) ,
+.Sq \&] ,
+.Sq \&' ,
+.Sq \&"
+.Pc .
+.Pp
+The proper spacing is also intelligently preserved if a sentence ends at
+the boundary of a macro line.
+.Pp
+Examples:
+.Bd -literal -offset indent -compact
+Do not end sentences mid-line like this. Instead,
+end a sentence like this.
+A macro would end like this:
+\&.Xr mandoc 1 \&.
+.Ed
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