[TUHS] Proliferation of options is great simplification of pipes, really?

[M Douglas McIlroy]

> I can imagine a simple perl (or python or whatever) script that would run
> through groff input [and] determine which preprocessors are actually
> needed ...

Brian imagined such and implemented it way back when. Though I used
it, I've forgotten its name. One probably could have fooled it by
tricks like calling pic only in a .so file and perhaps renaming .so.
But I never heard of it failing in real life. It does impose an extra
pass over the input, but may well save a pass compared to the
defensive groff -pet that I often use or to the rerun necessary when I
forget to mention some or all of the filters.