Path: utzoo!utgpu!attcan!uunet!seismo!sundc!pitstop!sun!decwrl!labrea!rutgers!gatech!bloom-beacon!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!osu-cis!att!pacbell!pbhyf!kjk
From: kjk@pbhyf.PacBell.COM (Ken Keirnan)
Newsgroups: comp.text
Subject: Re: troff magic
Message-ID: <3888@pbhyf.PacBell.COM>
Date: 2 Sep 88 17:32:51 GMT
References: <597@intvax.UUCP> <191@dcs.UUCP>
Reply-To: kjk@pbhyf.PacBell.COM (Ken Keirnan)
Organization: Pacific * Bell, San Ramon, CA
Lines: 46

>>In chapter 11, the following macro example was given to draw a line under
>>a string:
>>
>>.de us
>>\\$1\l'|0\\(ul'
>>..
>>
>>I understand everything except the "|0".  I assume it is the
>>N argument for the line drawing function, \l'Nc'.

[stuff deleted]

>As far as I can tell, this assumes that you are at the beginning of
>an output line. It prints the argument ( $1 ), then draws a line from the
>current print position (i.e. immediately after the argument) to absolute
>horizontal position 0 (i.e., back to the beginning of the line. It also
>leaves the current print position to be at the beginning of the line --
>thus it makes a good example, but is of little practical value. 


The absolute position indicator, "|" is relative to the "input" line
not the "output" line for horizontal motion.  That is why the above
macro will work as expected and only underline the argument $1, which,
in this case, is the "input" line.

Ken Keirnan



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-- 

Ken Keirnan - Pacific Bell - {att,bellcore,sun,ames,pyramid}!pacbell!pbhyf!kjk
  San Ramon, California	                    kjk@pbhyf.PacBell.COM