Re: [Groff] Comments affecting groff output?

[Tadziu Hoffmann]

> It also works (in Anton's example) without the dot, as in:
[snip]
> .   if (2=2) \{\"Remove this comment including the space in col. 17
[snip]
> .   if (2=2) \{\
> \"Remove this comment including the space in col. 17
[snip]
> .   if (2=2) \{
> \"Remove this comment including the space in col. 17

Sorry, I can't confirm that this works.  I get "Test not passed"
in all three cases.  Have you perhaps declared a blank line macro?


It is absolutely essential that the backslash is the
last character on the line, because only the sequence
<backslash><newline> gets removed, effectively replacing

  .if conditional \{\
  stuff
  .}

by

  .if conditional \{stuff
  .}


Similarly,

  .if conditional \{\
  \" comment
  stuff
  .}

*will* introduce a blank line, whereas

  .if conditional \{\
  .\" comment
  stuff
  .}

won't.