URL: <https://savannah.gnu.org/bugs/?67778>
Summary: [mdoc] subpar output with non-callable macro
Group: GNU roff
Submitter: None
Submitted: Sat 06 Dec 2025 12:48:02 AM UTC
Category: Macro package mdoc
Severity: 3 - Normal
Item Group: Rendering/Cosmetics
Status: None
Privacy: Public
Assigned to: None
Open/Closed: Open
Discussion Lock: Unlocked
Planned Release: None
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Follow-up Comments:
-------------------------------------------------------
Date: Sat 06 Dec 2025 12:48:02 AM UTC By: Anonymous
Jinwook Jeong posted the following syntax-erroneous mdoc file
(http://lists.gnu.org/r/groff/2025-10/msg00042.html):
.Dd September 1, 2025
.Dt EXAMPLE 1
.Os
.Sh NAME
.Nm Example
.Nd does absolutely nothing, but has a man page
.Sh DESCRIPTION
%N
.Pp
.Ql %N
With the latest mdoc code from git, groff outputs the following DESCRIPTION
section:
DESCRIPTION
%N
`
In a follow-up, Ingo opines: "This output certainly does not look desirable to
me, for two reasons: omitting the terminating quote seems quite wrong whatever
may be done with %N, and silently printing nothing whatsoever for %N feels
unhelpful, too: silent loss of information, silently not printing anything
where the author likely intended something, is usually not a good idea. ...
groff does not report the problem, and from black-box testing, i see no
indication that it even detects the problem. It looks more like the groff code
maybe gets internally confused and barrels on without even noticing its own
confusion."
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