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[groff] Inexplicable error using tbl(1) 1.19.2 on macOS


From: John Gardner
Subject: [groff] Inexplicable error using tbl(1) 1.19.2 on macOS
Date: Wed, 22 Aug 2018 06:46:36 +1000

I see this error each time I use man(1) on other people's MacBooks, and I'm
at a loss to explain why:

tbl:<standard input>:2: unrecognised format `o'
tbl:<standard input>:2: giving up on this table


The tbl markup is valid. In fact, this is all it's given that makes it
choke (it was culled down
<https://github.com/Alhadis/.files/blob/master/share/man/man5/textmate.5#L368-L492>
from a larger table that rendered perfectly fine on my old computer, which
had an up-to-date Groff & Co. installed).

.TS
Scope Description
comment For comments
.TE

Now, we all know Apple are clueless and continue to ship the most ancient
versions of software fathomable, but I find it impossible to believe that
at some point in Groff's history, there was a published tbl(1) release
whose only purpose was to spit confusing error messages, and nothing more.

Googling didn't shed insight, and the only result I found
<http://mac-os-forge.2317878.n4.nabble.com/man-groff-char-misbehaving-td300532.html>
would
suggest that the error is Apple-specific. But they didn't know the cause
either.

For the record, I've ruled out any man.conf settings, because it's
happening when I pipe input through the tbl binary directly:

λ Desktop: tbl < ./test.1
.if !\n(.g .ab GNU tbl requires GNU troff.
.if !dTS .ds TS
.if !dTE .ds TE
.lf 1 -
.TS
tbl:<standard input>:2: unrecognised format `o'
tbl:<standard input>:2: giving up on this table
.lf 4 -
.TE
λ Desktop: tbl --version
GNU tbl (groff) version 1.19.2


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