1 This file describes recent user-visible changes in groff. Bug fixes
2 are not described. There are more details in the man pages.
10 The anachronism of calling the man macro package with `-man' has been fixed;
11 now you can say `-m man' also. The same is true for `ms', `me', `markup',
14 A new switch `-g' for calling `grn' is available.
16 A new switch `-G' for calling `grap' is available.
18 EBCDIC support for tty devices has been added. On such hosts, IBM code page
19 1047 is available with -Tcp1047 instead of -Tascii and -Tlatin1 (and, for
20 the moment, -Tutf8). Note that non-tty devices are not yet supported (but
26 To solve a problem with the .PSPIC macro which needs the `-U' switch of
27 troff to access an external program (psbb), a new request .psbb is now
28 available to get the bounding box of a PostScript image file. The values
29 (in PostScript units) are returned in the new read-only number registers
30 `llx', `lly', `urx', and `ury'. Consequently, .PSPIC has been adapted to
31 use the new request, and the psbb program has been removed.
33 A new predefined writable number register, `year', has been added. It
34 contains the current year.
36 A new read-only register, `.Y', has been added. It contains the revision
37 number of the groff package.
39 `\fP' now behaves as expected in situations like the following where the
40 font `foo' is undefined:
43 normal text \f[foo]bar\fP normal text
45 Previously, the text after \fP appeared as bold.
47 The `substring' request is not new, but hasn't been documented before.
49 The predefined `.T' string register (which holds the current output device)
50 is not new, but hasn't been documented before.
52 A new request `length' computes the length of a string and returns it in
55 The macro files `tmac.a4' (for specifying A4 paper format) and `tmac.trace'
56 (a debugging aid) are now installed also.
58 A new resource file, `troffrc-end', is now available. It is invoked after
59 all user-specified macros. Currently used by the html device to include
60 tmac.html; thus no need for users to specify -mhtml anymore.
62 The soft hyphen character now has a glyph name: `shc'.
64 The latin-1 character 173 (PS name `periodcentered') has got the troff glyph
65 name `pc' and is no longer intermixed with the symbol character `md' (PS
68 ASCII character 34 (PS name `quotedbl') has got the troff glyph name `dq'
69 (which is an alias to character `"').
71 Some additions to the font description files have been implemented for
72 better support of HTML output:
74 The new format of lines in the `charset' subsection of font description
77 name metrics type code [entity_name] [-- comment]
79 Currently, only the font description files in devhtml use the optional
80 entity_name string to define glyph entities in HTML. Everything after the
81 entity_name field is ignored; in case this field isn't used, two hyphen
82 characters are now necessary to start a comment.
84 Two new requests are available in DESC files (currently used only with
87 use_charnames_in_special
88 This command indicates that troff should encode named characters
89 inside special commands.
92 requests that troff tells the driver the source file name being
93 processed. This is achieved by another tcommand: `F filename'.
98 Bruno Haible <haible@clisp.cons.org> contributed support for UTF8 output.
103 Added .LINE macro to tmac.arkup.
105 The obsolete `.LINK' macro has been removed.
107 .URL, .FTP, and .MAILTO macros now accept an optional third argument which
108 will be immediately appended to the second argument (to be used with
109 punctuation, for example).
114 The font size 11pt has been changed to 10.95pt (as used in LaTeX 2e).
119 A new driver for Canon CAPSL printers (LBP-4 and LBP-8 series laser
120 printers). This code has been contributed by Francisco Andres Verdu
121 <pandres@dragonet.es>.
126 A new preprocessor to process gremlin pictures. It is based on the
127 original Berkeley implementation of grn, written by David Slattengren
128 and Barry Roitblat, and has been adapted to groff by Daniel Senderowicz
129 <daniel@synchrods.com> and Werner Lemberg <wl@gnu.org>.
134 Added the `srand' command to set the seed for a new sequence of
135 pseudo-random numbers to be returned by `rand'.
140 Simplified installation: The Imakefile will now be configured (by groff's
146 Three new man pages are available: groff_tmac.5 (documenting how troff macros
147 are accessed and where they are found), groff.7 (a short reference of the GNU
148 roff language), and roff.7 (a general survey on GNU troff).
153 A port to win32 (for use with Microsoft Visual C++ 6.0) is now part of the
154 distribution. It has been contributed by Blake McBride
155 <blake@florida-software.com>.
157 More information about programs, macros, documentation, etc. which is
158 related to groff has been collected in the file `MORE.STUFF'.
160 VERSION 1.13, 1.14, 1.15
161 ========================
163 Bug fixes only; no user-visible changes.
168 Finally, there are new maintainers for groff. Mailing lists and a CVS
169 repository are available also. See the file README for details. Not
170 all reported bug could be fixed, so please send mails again if
171 something is still not working.
173 Most of the installation problems should have vanished now (most
174 notably the $(tmac_wrap) bug).
176 There is now a man page called groff_man.man which documents the
177 basics of the -man macros. It has been originally written by Susan
178 G. Kleinmann <sgk@debian.org>.
180 A (still incomplete) groff reference manual in texinfo format
181 originally contributed by Trent A. Fisher <trent@gnurd.portland.or.us>.
183 me.man and msafer.man have been renamed to groff_me.man
184 resp. groff_msafer.man for consistency.
186 Default strings for macros in doc-common resp. tmac.an no longer
187 contain the word `UNIX'.
189 groff should now be Y2k safe (fixes contributed by Paul Eggert
190 <eggert@twinsun.com>).
192 Following the GNU standards, groff will now use the prefix
193 `/usr/local/' as the default instead of replacing an existent groff
196 groff, troff, nroff, and pic now support the -U flag to activate unsafe
197 behaviour (without -msafer); the -S flag for using the -msafer macros
203 This is a new output device for producing HTML output contributed by
204 Gaius Mulley <gaius@glam.ac.uk>. It is still very alpha but has been
205 included into the distribution so that a lot of people have a chance
206 to test it. Bug reports are highly welcome.
211 Duplex printing support has been contributed by Jeffrey Copeland
217 Added -I option for defining include paths (patch contributed by Peter
218 Miller <peterm@jna.com.au>).
223 Fallback resources added (patch contributed by Larry Jones
224 <larry.jones@sdrc.com>).
226 Will now support 8 gray levels.
231 New version 1.32 (contributed by Joergen Haegg <jh@axis.com>).
236 Complete documentation for pic is now in the file doc/pic.ms. It was
237 contributed by Eric S. Raymond, <esr@thyrsus.com>, who is emphatically
238 *not* volunteering to take over groff as he is way overworked with
239 half a dozen other projects.
244 The directory where data files are installed has been changed from
245 /usr/local/lib/groff to /usr/local/share/groff to comply with the
246 latest GNU coding standards.
248 By default groff programs with Unix equivalents are installed with a
249 "g" prefix unless there is an existing (non-groff) troff installation.
251 A new approach is used to make system macro packages available to
252 groff. Instead of simply including /usr/lib/tmac in the list of
253 directories searched by groff, the installation process creates for
254 each system macro package a wrapper macro package in the groff macro
255 directory that references the system macro package. The groff macro
256 packages are now installed with a leading "g" prefix if there is a
257 system version of the same macro package, and otherwise without the
258 "g" prefix, with the exception that the groff version of -me which is
259 always installed as -me.
261 There is a new device, lj4, for the HP LaserJet 4 (and PCL5
267 groff has a -S option that prevents the use of unsafe features in pic
268 and troff. This uses a new -S option of pic and the -msafer macros
274 The `blm' request specifies a macro to be invoked when a blank line is
280 A -S (safer) option disables the sh command.
285 The -m option enables manual feed.
290 \(rn will now produce a character that has the traditional metrics,
291 and will form corners with \(ul and \(br. This means that it will not
292 align properly with \(sr. Instead there's a new character
293 \[radicalex] which aligns with \(sr; this is used by eqn for doing
299 The `pso' request allows you to read from the standard output of a
305 The PSPIC macro has options to allow the horizontal alignment of the
306 graphic to be specified.
314 The escape sequence \V[xxx] will interpolate the value of the
315 environment variable xxx.
320 The decimalpoint option can be used to specify the character to be
321 recognized as the decimal point character in place of the default
330 The environment variable GROFF_COMMAND_PREFIX can be used to control
331 whether groff looks for `gtroff' or `troff' (similarily for the
337 Multilingual hyphenation is supported by new `hpf' and `hla' requests,
338 and by a `\n[.hla]' number register. The -H option has been removed.
339 Files of hyphenation patterns can have comments.
341 When a font cannot be found, troff gives a warning (of type `font',
342 enabled by default) instead of an error.
344 There's a new request `trnt' that's like `tr' except that it doesn't
345 apply to text transparently throughput into a diversion with \!.
350 There is a `nokeep' option which tells tbl not to use diversions to
351 try to keep the table on one page.
356 Setting the parameter `nroff' to a non-zero value causes `ndefine' to
357 behave like `define' and `tdefine' to be ignored. This is done by
358 eqnrc when the current device is ascii or latin1. There's a `neqn'
359 script that just does `eqn -Tascii'.
364 grotty uses whatever page length was specified using the `pl' request
365 rather than using the paperlength command in the DESC file. The
366 paperwidth command in the DESC file is also ignored.
371 The programs in groff that have Unix counterparts can now be installed
372 without a leading `g' prefix. See the `g' variable in the Makefile.
374 The g?nroff script simulates the nroff command using groff.
376 New special characters \(+h, \(+f, \(+p, \(Fn, \(Bq, \(bq, \(aq, \(lz,
377 \(an. See groff_char(7).
379 ^L is now a legal input character.
384 The Xps pseudo-device has disappeared. Instead there is a new -X
385 option that tells groff to use gxditview instead of the usual
386 postprocessor. (So instead of -TXps, use -XTps or just -X if your
387 default device is ps.)
389 The postprocessor to be used for a particular device is now specified
390 by a `postpro' command in the DESC file rather than being compiled
391 into groff. Similarly the command to be used for printing (with the
392 -l option) is now specified by a `print' command in the DESC file.
394 The groff command no longer specifies eqnchar as an input file for
395 eqn. Instead eqn automatically loads a file `eqnrc'. The groff
396 command no longer passes the -D option to eqn. Instead eqnrc sets the
397 draw_lines parameter.
399 The groff command no longer tells troff to load a device-specific
400 macro file. This is handled instead by the `troffrc' file, which is
401 always loaded by troff.
403 The shell script version of groff has been removed.
408 The `rchar' request removes a character definition established with `char'.
410 Compatibility mode is disabled and the escape character is set to `\'
411 while a character definition is being processed.
413 The `\#' escape sequence is like `\"' except that the terminating
416 The `shc' request tells troff which character to insert (instead of
417 the default \(hy) when a word is hyphenated at a line break.
419 A font name of 0 (zero) in the DESC file will cause no font to be
420 mounted on the corresponding font position. This is useful for
421 arranging that special fonts are mounted on positions on which users
422 are not likely explicitly to mount fonts. All groff devices now avoid
423 initially mounting fonts on positions 5-9.
425 The `do' request allows a single request or macro to be interpreted
426 with compatibility mode disabled.
428 troff automatically loads a file `troffrc' before any other input file.
429 This can be prevented with the -R option. This file is responsible
430 for loading the device-specific macros.
435 The -x option has been removed and a -n option has been added. By
436 default, pic now assumes that the postprocessor supports groff
437 extensions. The -n option tells pic to generate output that works
438 with ditroff drivers. The -z option now applies only to TeX mode.
440 The -p option has been removed. Instead if the -n option is not
441 specified, pic generates output that uses \X'ps: ...' if the \n(0p
442 register is non-zero and tmac.ps sets this register to 1.
444 In places where you could 1st or 5th you can now say `i'th or `i+1'th
445 (the quotes are required).
450 Eqn now automatically reads a file `eqnrc' from the macro directory.
451 This performs the same role that the eqnchar files used to. This can
452 be prevented by the -R option.
454 Setting the draw_lines parameter to a non-zero value causes lines to
455 be drawn using \D rather than \l. The -D option is now obsolete.
457 `uparrow', `downarrow' and `updownarrow' can be used with `left' and
460 The amount of extra space added before and after lines containing
461 equations can be controlled using the `body_height' and `body_depth'
467 Font description files have been regenerated from newer AFM files.
468 You can get access to the additional characters present in the text
469 fonts in newer PostScript printers by using -mpsnew.
471 The default value of the -b option is specified by a `broken' command
474 With the -g option, grops will generate PostScript code that guesses
475 the page height. This allows documents to be printed on both letter
476 (8.5x11) and A4 paper without change.
481 ISO Latin-1 characters are available with -Tdvi. Format groff_char(7)
482 with groff -Tdvi for more information.
487 The -mtty-char macros contain additional character definitions for
493 In previous releases the groff -me macros treated the $r and $R number
494 registers in a way that was incompatible with the BSD -me macros. The
495 reason for this was that the approach used by the BSD -me macros does
496 not work with low resolution devices such as -TX75 and -TX100.
497 However, this caused problems with existing -me documents. In this
498 release, the vertical spacing is controlled by the $v and $V registers
499 which have the same meaning as $r and $R in earlier groff releases.
500 In addition, if the $r or $R register is set to a value that would be
501 correct for for the BSD -me macros and a low resolution device is not
502 being used, then an appropriate value for the $v or $V register will
503 be derived from the $r or $R register.
505 The groff -me macros work with -C and (I think) with Unix troff.
507 For backward compatibility with BSD -me, the \*{ and \*} strings are
508 also available as \*[ and \*]. Of course, \*[ will only be usable
511 The \*T string has been deleted. Use \*(Tm instead.
516 The `n', Space and Return keys are bound to the Next Page action. The
517 `p', BackSpace and Delete keys are bound to the Previous Page action.
518 The `q' key is bound to the Quit action.
520 The `r' key is bound to a rerasterize action that reruns groff, and
521 redisplays the current page.
529 There is a alternative assignment operator `:=' which interacts
530 differently with blocks.
532 There is a new command `command', which allows the values of variables
533 to be passed through to troff or TeX.
535 The `print' command now accepts multiple arguments.
537 String comparison expressions (using `==' or `!=') are allowed in more
543 Horizontal and vertical lines drawn with \D'l ...' will be rendered
544 using -, | and + characters. This is intended to give reasonable
545 results with boxed tables. It won't work well with pic.
550 The -mdoc macros have been upgraded to the version in the second
551 Berkeley networking release. This version is not completely
552 compatible with earlier versions; the old version is still available
553 as -mdoc.old. The grog script has been enhanced so that it can
554 usually determine whether a document requires the old or new versions.
556 With -TX75, -TX100 and -TXps, the PSPIC macro will produce a box
557 around where the picture would appear with -Tps.
562 An implementation of the -mm macros is included.
564 The directory in which temporary files are created can be controlled
565 by setting the GROFF_TMPDIR or TMPDIR environment variables.
570 Some MS-DOS support (see pic/make-dos-dist).
575 There are two new \X commands (\X'ps: invis' and \X'ps: endinvis')
576 which make it possible to have substitute characters that are
577 displayed when previewing with -TXps but ignored when printing with
583 Support for scalable fonts.
588 No changes other than bug fixes.
593 There is an implementation of refer and associated programs. groff -R
594 preprocesses with grefer; no mechanism is provided for passing
595 arguments to grefer because most grefer options have equivalent
596 commands which can be included in the file. grog also supports refer.
598 There is an alternative perl implementation of the grog script.
600 The code field in lines in the charset section of font description
601 files is now allowed to contain an arbitrary integer (previously it
602 was required to lie between 0 and 255). Currently grops and grodvi
603 use only the low order 8 bits of the value. Grodvi will use the
604 complete value; however, this is unlikely to be useful with
605 traditional TeX tools (.tfm files only allow 8 bit character codes.)
607 Left and right double quotes can be obtained with \(lq and \(rq
610 There is a new program called pfbtops which translates PostScript
611 fonts in pfb format to ASCII.
613 A slightly modified version of the Berkeley tmac.doc is included.
618 In long escape names the closing ] is now required to be at the same
619 input level as the opening [.
621 The \A'S' escape sequence returns 1 or 0 according as S is or is not
622 suitable for use as a name.
624 \~ produces an unbreakable space that can be stretched when the line
627 The `mso' request is like the `so' request except that it searches for
628 the file in the same directories in which tmac.X is searched for when
629 the -mX option is given.
631 The escape sequence `\R' is similar to the `nr' request.
636 A new `special' primitive allows you to add new types of unary
637 constructs by writing a troff macro.
642 The implementation no longer uses gperf.
647 The compile-time -DBROKEN_SPOOLER option has been replaced by a
648 BROKEN_SPOOLER_FLAGS option. This allows more precise control over
649 how grops should workaround broken spoolers and previewers. There is
650 a new -b option that can change this at run-time.
652 Grops now generates PostScript that complies with version 3.0 of the
653 Document Structuring Convention.
655 The resource management component of grops (the part that deals with
656 imported documents and downloadable fonts) has been rewritten and now
657 supports version 3.0 of the Document Structuring Conventions. The
658 %%DocumentFonts comment is no longer supported; you must use the
659 %%Document{Needed,Supplied}{Fonts,Resources} comments instead
662 tmac.psatk contains some macros that support the mechanism used by the
663 Andrew Toolkit for including PostScript graphics in troff documents.
668 Parts of xditview have been rewritten so that it can be used with the
669 output of gtroff -Tps. groff -TXps will run gtroff -Tps with
672 There is a new menu entry `Print' which brings up a dialog box for
673 specifying a command with which the file being previewed should be
676 Xditview now uses imake.
681 The groff command now understands the gtroff `-a' and `-i' options.
683 With the `m' and `n' scale indicators, the scale factor is rounded
684 horizontally before being applied. This makes (almost) no difference
685 for devices with `hor' equal to 1, but it makes groff with -Tascii or
686 -Tlatin1 behave more like nroff in its treatment of these scale
687 indicators. Accordingly tmac.tty now calls the `nroff' request so
688 that the `n' condition will be true.
690 The device-specific macros (tmac.ps, tmac.dvi, tmac.tty and tmac.X)
691 have been made to work at least somewhat with -C. In particular the
692 special characters defined by these macros now work with -C.
694 groff -Tdvi -p will now pass pic the -x flag; this will enable filling
695 of arrowheads and boxes, provided that your dvi driver supports the
696 latest version of the tpic specials.
701 There is a new `-N' option that tells eqn not to allow newlines in
702 delimiters. This allows eqn to recover better from missing closing
703 delimiters. The groff command will pass on a `-N' option to eqn.
708 You can now use psfig with grops. See the file ps/psfig.diff. I do
709 not recommend using psfig for new documents.
711 The command \X'ps: file F' is similar to \X'ps: exec ...' except that
712 the PostScript code is read from the file F instead of being contained
713 within the \X command. This was added to support psfig.
718 There are font files HB and HI corresponding to cmsssbx10 and cmssi10.
723 The groff -me macros now work with the -C option. As a result, they
724 may also work with Unix nroff/troff.
726 In -me, the $r and $R number registers now contain the line spacing as
727 a percentage of the pointsize expressed in units (normally about 120).
728 The previous definition was useless with low resolution devices such
734 A -ms-like macro-package is now included.
736 The name for the Icelandic lowercase eth character has been changed
742 There is a new request `nroff', which makes the `n' built-in condition
743 true and the `t' built-in condition false; also a new request `troff'
744 which undoes the effect of the `nroff' request. This is intended only
745 for backward compatibility: it is usually better to test \n(.H or
746 \n(.V or to use the `c' built-in condition.
748 The \R escape sequence has been deleted. Use \E instead.
750 There are `break' and `continue' requests for use with the `while'
753 There is a request `hym' that can ensure that when the current
754 adjustment mode is not `b' a line will not be hyphenated if it is no
755 more than a given amount short, and a request `hys' that can ensure
756 that when the current adjustment mode is `b' a line will not be
757 hyphenated if it can be justified by adding no more than a given
758 amount of extra space to each word space.
760 There is a request `rj' similar to `ce' that right justifies lines.
762 A warning of type `space' will be given when a call is made to an
763 undefined request or macro with a name longer than two characters, and
764 the first two characters of the name make a name that is defined.
765 This is intended to find places where a space has been omitted been a
766 request or macro and its argument. This type of warning is enabled by
772 A comma is permitted between the arguments to the `reset' command.
774 For use with TeX, there is a new `-c' option that makes gpic treat
775 lines beginning with `.' in a way that is more compatible with tpic
781 It is no longer necessary to add `space 0' at the beginning of
782 complicated equations inside pictures.
784 `prime' is now treated as an ordinary character, as in Unix eqn. The
785 previous behaviour of `prime' as an operator can now be obtained using
791 There are two new devices X75-12 and X100-12 which are the same as X75
792 and X100 except that they are optimized for documents that use mostly
798 The installation process has been refined to make it easy for you to
799 share groff with someone who has the same type of machine as you but
800 does not have a C++ compiler. See the end of the INSTALL file for
803 There is a man page for the tfmtodit program which explains how to use
804 your own fonts with groff -Tdvi.
806 There is a man page for afmtodit which explains how to use your own
807 PostScript fonts with groff -Tps.
809 The \N escape sequence is now fully supported. It can now be used to
810 access any character in a font by its output code, even if it doesn't
811 have a groff name. This is made possible by a convention in the font
812 files that a character name of `---' refers to an unnamed character.
813 The drivers now all support the `N' command required for this. The font
814 description files have been updated to include unnamed characters.
816 The `x' command in font description files has been removed: instead
817 any unknown commands are automatically made available to the drivers.
818 If you constructed your own font files with an earlier version of
819 tfmtodit or afmtodit, you must construct them again using the current
822 Characters between 0200 and 0237 octal are no longer legal input
823 characters. Note that these are not used in ISO 8859.
825 A command called `grog' has been added, similar to the `doctype'
826 command described in Kernighan and Pike.
831 The groff command has some new options: -V prints the pipeline
832 instead of executing it; -P passes an argument to the postprocessor,
833 -L passes an argument to the spooler.
835 There is a C++ implementation of the groff command. This handles some
836 things slightly better than the shell script. In particular, it can
837 correctly handle arguments containing characters that have a special
838 meaning to the shell; it can give an error message when child
839 processes other than the last in the pipeline terminate abnormally;
840 its exit status can take account of the exit statuses of all its child
841 processes; it is a little more efficient; when geqn is used, it
842 searches for the eqnchar file in the same way that font metric files
843 are searched for, rather than expecting to find it in one particular
849 There is font translation feature: For example, you can tell gtroff to
850 use font `HR' whenever font `H' is requested with the line
852 This would be useful for a document that uses `H' to refer to
855 There are some new number registers: `.kern' contains the current kern
856 mode, `.lg' the current ligature mode, `.x' the major version number,
857 `.y' the minor version number, `.ce' the number of lines to be
858 centered in the current environment, `.trunc' the amount of vertical
859 space truncated by the most recently sprung vertical position trap,
860 `.ne' the amount of vertical space needed in the last `ne' request
861 that caused a vertical position trap to be sprung.
863 The `cf' request now behaves sensibly in a diversion. If used in a
864 diversion, it will now arrange for the file to be copied to the output
865 when the diversion is reread.
867 There is a new request `trf' (transparent file) similar to `cf', but
870 There is a new escape sequence `\Y[xxx]', roughly equivalent to
871 `\X'\*[xxx]'', except that the contents of string or macro xxx are not
872 interpreted, and xxx may contain newlines. This requires an output
873 format extension; the drivers have been modified to understand this.
874 Grops has also been modified to cope with newlines in the arguments to
875 \X commands; grops has a new \X command mdef, which is like def except
876 that it has a first argument giving the number of definitions.
878 There is a new warning category `escape' which warns about unknown
881 The `fp' request now takes an optional third argument giving the external
884 The `\_' character is now automatically translated to `\(ul' as in troff.
886 The environment variable `GROFF_HYPHEN' gives the name of the file
887 containing the hyphenation patterns.
889 There is a `\C'xxx'' escape sequence equivalent to `\[xxx]'.
891 Characters ", ', ), ], *, \(dg are now initially transparent for the purposes
892 of end of sentence recognition.
894 There is an anti-recursion feature in the `char' request, so you can
895 say `.char \(bu \s+2\(bu\s-2'.
897 The limit on the number of font positions has been removed.
898 Accordingly `\n[.fp]' never returns 0.
900 The restriction on the number of numbered environments has been removed.
902 There is a new escape sequence `\E' that makes it possible to
903 guarantee that an escape sequence won't get interpreted in copy-mode.
904 The `\R' escape sequence is accordingly now deprecated.
909 Arguments of the form `X anything X' (in the `copy thru', `sh', `for',
910 `if' and `define' constructs) can now be of the form `{ anything }'.
912 If the `linethick' variable is negative (as it now is initially),
913 lines will be drawn with a thickness proportional to the current point
916 The `rand' function now takes no arguments and returns a number between
917 0 and 1. The old syntax is still supported.
919 `^' can be used in expressions to indicate exponentiation.
921 In the `for' construct the argument to the by clause can be prefixed
922 by `*' to indicate that the increment is multiplicative.
924 A bare expression may be used as an attribute. If the current
925 direction is `dir', then an attribute `expr' is equivalent to
928 There is a `sprintf' construct that allows numbers to be formatted and used
929 wherever a quoted string can be used.
931 The height of a text object without an explicit height attribute is
932 the number of text strings associated with the object times the value
933 of the `textht' variable.
935 The maximum height and width of a picture is controlled by the
936 `maxpswid' and `maxpsht' variables.
941 Gtbl can now handle gracefully the situation where the `ce' request
942 has been applied to a table.
947 The `ifdef' primitive has been generalized.
949 A tilde accent can be put underneath a box using `utilde'. This
950 defined using a general `uaccent' primitive.
955 There is a new PostScript font downloading scheme which handles font
956 downloading for imported illustrations. Previously, the name of the
957 file containing the font was given in the `x download' line in the
958 groff font metric file. Now, there is a `download' file which says
959 for each PostScript font name which file contains that font. Grops
960 can also now handle inter-font dependencies, where one downloadable
961 font depends on some other (possibly downloadable) font.
963 The `T' font has been removed. The characters it used to provide are
964 now provided by `char' definitions in tmac.ps. TSymbol.ps has also
965 been removed, and the tweaks it provided are now provided by `char'