[TUHS] Open source "code" for books typeset in troff

[Adam Koszek]

Branden, the only resources in English from him that I know of are from his website. Working links:

http://www.kohala.com/start/pagelayout.html
http://www.kohala.com/start/indexing.html
http://www.kohala.com/start/chartjunk.html

but it may not be enough.

Adam

> On May 28, 2025, at 6:52 PM, G. Branden Robinson <g.branden.robinson at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> [looping in groff list]
> 
> Hi Larry and Adam,
> 
>>> On May 27, 2025, at 6:55 PM, Larry McVoy <lm at mcvoy.com> wrote:
>>> The [troff macros] you want are [those used to compose] the Stevens
>>> books.  That guy made troff sing, he walked me through his process
>>> years (decades?) ago.  He really knew troff and those books have
>>> held up to this day.
>>> 
>>> No idea if the source is anywhere, but if it is, that should be
>>> archived because that is some great work.
> 
> I too am a fan of W. Richard Stevens's work.  I am disappointed that he
> passed long before I became involved in groff development and therefore
> had an excuse to frequently engage with him--I am certain I would have
> learned much about *roff and other things.
> 
> At 2025-05-28T16:17:04-0700, Adam Koszek wrote:
>> Multiple authors attributed good looks of their books to his macros. I
>> wonder if anyone has a backup...
> 
> Alternatively or additionally, if someone has a thorough English-
> language description of those macros at the level of detail of a
> specification, then I can see them becoming part of the GNU roff
> distribution, either as a "contributed" component or as part of the
> "official" system, depending on who did the work and what copyright they
> were comfortable applying to it.[1]
> 
> I emphasize that, for groff, "contrib" is not a wastebasket directory on
> a website; everything in the "contrib" directory of groff's Git
> repository gets built and shipped, and distributors generally provide
> the materials therein.  Some of it gets automated testing and/or has
> seen recent bug fixes and development too, as with the groff version of
> the mm macros, and Peter Schaffter's popular (and sophisticated) "mom"
> package.
> 
> Regards,
> Branden
> 
> [1] groff's "LICENSES" file attempts to illuminate these matters.

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