Re: [Groff] Is there a good man page style guide somewhere?

[Bernd Warken]

On Thu, Oct 11, 2001 at 01:25:31AM -0000, address@hidden wrote:
> There are a whole bunch of little details that seem worth getting right.
> When typesetting the option "[-z level]", should there be a space between
> "-z" and "level"?  I have seen it both ways.  The groff(1) man page omits
> the space, but my Debian man(1) man page inclides them.

If the program used POSIX getopt() or getopt_long(), see getopt(3), or 
getopt(1) on the command line the space is optional, while 
getopt_long_only() makes the space a must.  For readability reasons,
it is better to add a space between the command and its argument 
whenever possible because POSIX allows strange option clusters of single
character options behind a single '-'.
> 
> Is there a reference guide somewhere?
> (And is there somewhere else I should be asking?)o
> 
man(7) should define the standard. But it seems to be out-of-date and
badly supported. Moreover, there were incompatibilities with groff.

So, ye oulde man fellows, get together and remount the horse!

Bernd Warken