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From: tim@ora.UUCP (Tim O'Reilly)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: nroff problems
Message-ID: <645@ora.UUCP>
Date: Thu, 30-Jul-87 09:06:28 EDT
Article-I.D.: ora.645
Posted: Thu Jul 30 09:06:28 1987
Date-Received: Sat, 1-Aug-87 11:52:34 EDT
References: <774@PSUECLB>
Organization: O'Reilly & Associates, Inc., Newton, MA
Lines: 27
Summary: use col for reverse line feeds

In article <774@PSUECLB>, duh@psueclb.BITNET writes:
>         I'm trying to print a Spice user's manual, which happens to
> be an nroff document.  The problem is that nroff doesn't put form
> feed characters in.... 

Nroff uses line feeds, not form feeds to advance.  The
problem is probably that your laser printer needs a certain
number of lines on the page before it thinks its time to
eject the page.  Try adjusting the page length or adding extra 
line feeds to trigger a page break in your laser printer.

> How do I do it?  Do I need to make a new terminal definition file?
> If so, I don't know how, and can't find it in any of the documentation
> we have.  
I don't think this is your problem.  However, if you're
using nroff a lot, it may be worthwhile to learn about
this.  I seem to recall a piece by Eric Allman on writing nroff
terminal definition files floating around the net about 6 or
7 months ago.  Does anyone have this?

>         Also, one of the appendicies is full of equations, and uses the
> eqn program.  With eqn, I get zillions of "Floating Exception" errors,
> and I can't figure out why.  I tried neqn, and it worked.  But, the
> escape sequences it put in to do upward and downward cursor movements
> don't work on our laser printer (DEC ln03), or line printer (DEC lg02).

You should always use neqn with nroff (eqn goes with troff).  Then
pipe the output through col before printing.  This filters out
the reverse line feeds and puts everything in the proper
order for printing on a line printer.

-- 
Tim O'Reilly (617) 527-4210
O'Reilly & Associates, Inc., Publishers of Nutshell Handbooks
981 Chestnut Street, Newton, MA 02164
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