svn commit: r333494 - head/share/man/man7

[Rodney W. Grimes]

> On Sat, May 12, 2018, 12:59 AM Rodney W. Grimes <
> freebsd at pdx.rh.cn85.dnsmgr.net> wrote:
> 
> > > On Fri, May 11, 2018 at 8:26 AM, Rodney W. Grimes
> > > <freebsd at pdx.rh.cn85.dnsmgr.net> wrote:
> > > >> @@ -67,7 +72,8 @@ Changes are first committed to CURRENT and then
> > usuall
> > > >>  to STABLE.
> > > >>  Every few years the CURRENT branch is renamed to STABLE, and a new
> > > >>  CURRENT is branched, with an incremented major version number.
> > > >> -Releases are then branched off STABLE and numbered with consecutive
> > minor numbers.
> > > >> +Releases are then branched off STABLE and numbered with consecutive
> > minor
> > > >> +numbers.
> > > >
> > > > Proper place to line break long lines is at conjuncatives such
> > > > as the "and" above, yeilding:
> > >
> > > What?  Are you just inventing these rules out of blue sky?  What
> > > possible reason is there to do as you have proposed?
> >
> > Well known and established man page style rules, documented someplace,
> > which I can not seem to locate right now.
> >
> 
> Could you please find that if possible and share with us?
> Personally I'm about to rewrite some man page and that would be useful in
> my case!

It did take me some time to track down this "crazy concept you all
think I just invented", but it is infact in the GNU groff info
documentaton (found on my 5.4 systems in /usr/share/info/groff.info.gz):


   Here are a few hints for preparing text for input to `gtroff'.

   * First, keep the input lines short.  Short input lines are easier to
     edit, and `gtroff' packs words onto longer lines anyhow.

   * In keeping with this, it is helpful to begin a new line after every
     comma or phrase, since common corrections are to add or delete
     sentences or phrases.

   * End each sentence with two spaces - or better, start each sentence
     on a new line.  `gtroff' recognizes characters that usually end a
     sentence, and inserts sentence space accordingly.

   * Do not hyphenate words at the end of lines - `gtroff' is smart
     enough to hyphenate words as needed, but is not smart enough to
     take hyphens out and join a word back together.  Also, words such
     as "mother-in-law" should not be broken over a line, since then a
     space can occur where not wanted, such as "mother- in-law".


Regards,
-- 
Rod Grimes                                                 rgrimes at freebsd.org