[bug #64087] more explicitly document transition onto first page

[Dave]

URL:
  <https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?64087>

                 Summary: more explicitly document transition onto first page
                   Group: GNU roff
               Submitter: barx
               Submitted: Fri 21 Apr 2023 03:34:32 PM CDT
                Category: Core
                Severity: 2 - Minor
              Item Group: Documentation
                  Status: None
                 Privacy: Public
             Assigned to: None
             Open/Closed: Open
         Discussion Lock: Any
         Planned Release: None


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Follow-up Comments:


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Date: Fri 21 Apr 2023 03:34:32 PM CDT By: Dave <barx>
Bug #63777 documented this for most cases real users will care about, but
Branden brought up a situation Obfuscated Coders may need to know about (see
comment 3 over there).  The rest of this is his words, lightly redacted to
remove an Heirloom troff oddity that has no bearing here:

A horizontal motion of zero length ... _is_ output, and I would expect it to
cause a page transition if one is in the twilight zone.  And it does.


$ cat ATTIC/h.roff 
.tm 1: nl=\n(nlu
\h'0'
.tm 2: nl=\n(nlu
.pl \n(nlu
$ nroff ATTIC/h.roff >/dev/null # groff 1.22.4
1: nl=-1u
2: nl=0u

I think the manual, as it gets on toward the end of the formatter reference
(currently, chapter 5), needs to start discussing the distinction between
formatter instructions that change the environment, those that produce output,
and those that do neither (register, string, macro definitions and
manipulation).

Eventually this background will better prepare the advanced _groff_ reader to
grapple with the internal "node" concept.







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