Subject: groff question: update needs less -R
To: None <tech-userlevel@netbsd.org>
From: Thomas Klausner <wiz@netbsd.org>
List: tech-userlevel
Date: 06/15/2003 00:28:44
Hi!

groff-1.19, which I'm working on importing into NetBSD,
uses SGR (ANSI) as markup instead of whatever that's
called what the currently used groff uses.
The change was done since this way, groff can support color.

xterms display man pages like that fine by default, but
less needs -R as argument to display them, otherwise the
SGR markup is displayed as noise.

One solution would be to add -R to the default pager options
in usr.bin/man/pathconf.h. That should work, but users
setting their own PAGER would probably have to adapt.
less -R displays old-style man pages fine.

Another solution is to default to the previous behaviour.
The command line option to switch back to compat-behaviour
is not a toggle, so if we want to allow the ANSI behaviour
too, we'd diverge a bit from "normal" groff.

I guess I prefer option 1.

Comments?
 Thomas