RE: [Groff] What's valid in \X?

[Ted Harding]

On 26-Oct-99 Larry Jones wrote:
> In trying to produce PostScript that contains PDF stuff, I've
> discovered that \X objects to things like \& and \ --presumably
> because they don't convert to ASCII very well--although it's quite
> happy with font changes and size changes.  It seems to me that it
> would be more useful to quietly ignore \& and to convert the other
> kinds of spaces (\ , \0, \|, and \^) to ordinary spaces.  What do
> others think?
> 
> -Larry Jones

I don't think I understand this query.

Could we have an explicit full example or two, and a statement of what
they're intended to achieve?

The general rule is that \X'...' passes "x X ..." transparently to the
postprocessor (device driver) except that escape sequences are
processed by troff. I'm having trouble imagining why you'd want to
include "\&" etc (with their troff meanings) in input to the PS device
driver. The things that grops will accept are given in "man groff"
and I can't see much place for these escapes in that.

Thanks,
Ted.


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E-Mail: (Ted Harding) <address@hidden>
Date: 26-Oct-99                                       Time: 23:07:50
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