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[bug #55278] src/devices/grotty/grotty.1.man, doc/groff.texi updates


From: Dave
Subject: [bug #55278] src/devices/grotty/grotty.1.man, doc/groff.texi updates
Date: Fri, 12 Jun 2020 22:35:45 -0400 (EDT)
User-agent: Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux i686; rv:45.0) Gecko/20100101 Firefox/45.0

Follow-up Comment #7, bug #55278 (project groff):

I see your point on some of those. The stuff about how spacing isn't preserved
might be worth a mention.

But I think there's value in not overdocumenting what can be easily gleaned by
looking at the output; e.g., the line "<beginning of page>" is essentially
self-documenting.

The output is called an "ASCII approximation," which already communicates that
it won't reflect its input exactly.  And documenting exactly how special
characters are output today means locking in that output forevermore; leaving
them unspecified gives the groff maintainers of 2040 flexibility to change
them if the need arises.  (Hopefully no one is using -a output in production,
minimizing back-compatibility concerns if it changes.  But it strengthens that
position if the only documented result is that that output is an
approximation, with no promises about just how things are approximated.)

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