svcadm(8)을 검색하려면 섹션에서 8 을 선택하고, 맨 페이지 이름에 svcadm을 입력하고 검색을 누른다.
groff_mm(7)
groff_mm(7) Miscellaneous Information Manual groff_mm(7)
Name
groff_mm - memorandum macros for GNU roff
Synopsis
groff -mm [option ...] [file ...]
groff -m mm [option ...] [file ...]
Description
The GNU implementation of the mm macro package is part of the groff
document formatting system. The mm package is suitable for the compo‐
sition of letters, memoranda, reports, and books.
Call an mm macro at the beginning of a document to initialize the pack‐
age. A simple mm document might use only P for paragraphing. Set num‐
bered and unnumbered section headings with H and HU, respectively.
Change the style of the typeface with B, I, and R; you can alternate
styles with BI, BR, IB, IR, RB, and RI. Several nestable list types
are available via AL, BL, BVL, DL, ML, RL, and VL; each of these begins
a list, to which LI adds an item and LE ends the (nested) list. Cus‐
tomized list arrangements are supported by LB. DS and DF start static
and floating displays, respectively; either is terminated with DE.
groff mm is intended to be compatible with the mm implementation found
in the AT&T Documenter's Workbench (DWB), with the following limita‐
tions.
• Omitted features include the logo and company name strings, }Z and
]S, respectively; the encoded company site location addresses recog‐
nized as the third argument to the AU macro; the Pv (“private” head‐
ing) register; and the OK (other keywords), and PM (proprietary mark‐
ings) macros.
• The CS (output cover sheet) macro is implemented only for memorandum
type 4.
• The grap preprocessor is not explicitly supported; no G1 and G2
macros are defined.
• The registers A, C, E, T, and U, typically set from the troff or
nroff command lines with DWB mm, are not recognized.
• When setting the registers L or W from the command line, use an ex‐
plicit scaling unit to avoid surprises.
• DWB mm's nP macro indented the second line of a paragraph to align it
with the start of the text of the first (after the paragraph number);
groff mm's does not.
• Cut marks are not supported.
DWB mm supported only seven levels of heading. As a compatible exten‐
sion, groff mm supports fourteen, introducing new registers H8 through
H14, and affecting the interpretation of the HF and HP strings.
Macro, register, and string descriptions in this page frequently men‐
tion each other; most cross references are to macros. Where a register
or string is referenced, its type is explicitly identified. mm's macro
names are usually in full capitals; registers and strings tend to have
mixed-case names.
Document styles
groff mm offers three different frameworks for document organization.
COVER/COVEND is a flexible means of preparing any document requiring a
cover page. LT/LO aids preparation of typical Anglophone correspon‐
dence (business letters, for example). The MT memorandum type mecha‐
nism implements a group of formal styles historically used by AT&T Bell
Laboratories. Your document can select at most one of these ap‐
proaches; when used, each disables the others.
Localization
groff mm is designed to be easily localized. For languages other than
English, strings that can appear in output are collected in the file
/usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/xx.tmac, where xx is an ISO 639 two-letter
language identifier. Localization packages should be loaded after mm;
for example, you might format a Swedish mm document with the command
“groff -mm -msv”.
This package can also be localized by site or territory; for example,
/usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/mse.tmac illustrates how to adapt the out‐
put to a national standard using its ISO 3166 territory code. Such a
package can define a string that causes a macro file
/usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/mm/territory_locale to be loaded at pack‐
age initialization. If this mechanism is not used,
/usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/mm/locale is loaded instead. No diagnos‐
tic is produced if these files do not exist.
Registers and strings
Much mm behavior can be configured by registers and strings. A regis‐
ter is assigned with the nr request.
.nr ident [±]n [i]
ident is the name of the register, and n is the value to be assigned.
n can be prefixed with a plus or minus sign if incrementation or decre‐
mentation (respectively) of the register's existing value by n is de‐
sired. If assignment of a (possibly) negative n is required, further
prefix it with a zero or enclose it in parentheses. If i is specified,
the register is automatically modified by i prior to interpolation if a
plus or minus sign is included in the escape sequence as follows.
\n[±][ident]
i can be negative; it combines algebraically with the sign in the in‐
terpolation escape sequence.
Strings are defined with the ds request.
.ds ident contents
contents consumes everything up to the end of the line, including
trailing spaces. It is a good practice to end contents with a comment
escape sequence (\") so that extraneous spaces do not intrude during
document maintenance. To include leading spaces in contents, prefix it
with a double quote. Strings are interpolated with the \* escape se‐
quence.
\*[ident]
Register and string name spaces are distinct, but strings and macros
share a name space. Defining a string with the same name as an mm
macro is not supported and may cause incorrect rendering, the emission
of diagnostic messages, and an error exit status from troff.
Register format
A register is interpolated using Arabic numerals if no other format has
been assigned to it. Assign a format to a register with the af re‐
quest.
.af R c
R is the name of the register, and c is the format. If c is a sequence
of Arabic numerals, their quantity defines a zero-padded minimum width
for the interpolated register value.
tab(@); lb lb l l. Form@Sequence 1@0, 1, 2, 3, ..., 10, ...
001@000, 001, 002, 003, ..., 1000, ... i@0, i, ii, iii, iv, ...
I@0, I, II, III, IV, ... a@0, a, b, c, ..., z, aa, ab, ...
A@0, A, B, C, ..., Z, AA, AB, ...
Fonts
In groff mm, the fonts (or rather, font styles) R (roman), I (italic),
and B (bold) are mounted at font positions 1, 2, and 3, respectively.
Internally, font positions are used for backward compatibility. From a
practical point of view, it doesn't make a big difference—a different
font family can still be selected by invoking groff's fam request or
using its -f command-line option. On the other hand, if you want to
replace just, for example, font I with Zapf Chancery Medium italic
(available on groff's pdf and ps output devices), you have to use the
fp request, replacing the font at position 2 with “.fp 2 ZCMI”). Be‐
cause the cover sheet, memorandum type, and refer(1) integration macros
explicitly request fonts named B, I, and R, you will also need to remap
these font names with the ftr request, for instance with “.ftr I ZCMI”.
Macros
An explicitly empty argument may be specified with a pair of double
quotes; to call a macro XX with an empty second argument but non-empty
first and third ones, you could input the following.
.XX foo "" baz
Macro names longer than two characters are GNU extensions; some shorter
names were not part of DWB mm's published interface but are documented
aspects of groff mm.
)E level text
Add heading text text to the table of contents with level, which
is either 0 or in the range 1 to 7. See also H. This undocu‐
mented DWB mm macro is exposed by groff mm to enable customized
tables of contents.
1C [1] Format page text in one column. The page is broken. A 1 argu‐
ment suppresses this break; its use may cause body text and a
pending footnote to overprint. See 2C, MC, and NCOL.
2C Begin two-column formatting. This is a special case of MC. See
1C and NCOL.
AE Abstract end; stop collecting abstract text. See AS.
AF [firm-name]
Specify firm associated with the document. At most one can be
declared; the firm name is used by memorandum types and avail‐
able to cover sheets. AF terminates a document title started
with TL, and can be called without an argument for that purpose.
See MT and COVER.
AL [type [text-indent [1]]]
Begin an auto-incrementing numbered list. Item numbers start at
one. The type argument assigns the register format (see above)
of the list item enumerators. The default is 1. An explicitly
empty type also indicates the default. A text-indent argument
overrides register Li. A third argument suppresses the blank
line that normally precedes each list item. Use LI to declare
list items, and LE to end the list.
APP [id [title]]
Begin an appendix. If the identifier id is omitted, it is in‐
cremented (or initialized, if necessary). The register format
used for id is “A”. The page is broken. The register Aph de‐
termines whether an appendix heading is then formatted. This
heading uses the string App followed by id. Appendices appear
in any table of contents (see TC). The string Apptxt is set to
title if the latter is present, and made empty otherwise.
APPSK id n [title]
As APP, but increment the page number by n. Use this macro to
“skip pages” when diagrams or other materials not formatted by
troff are included in appendices.
AS [placement [indentation]]
Abstract start; begin collecting abstract. Input up to the next
AE call is included in the abstract. placement influences the
location of the abstract on the cover sheet of a memorandum (see
MT). COVER, by contrast, ignores placement by default, but can
be customized to interpret it.
tab(@); lf(BI) lb l lx. placement@Effect 0@T{ The abstract ap‐
pears on page 1 and cover sheet if the document is a “released
paper” memorandum (“.MT 4”); otherwise, it appears on page 1
without a cover sheet. T} 1@T{ The abstract appears only on the
cover sheet (“.MT 4” only). T}
An abstract does not appear at all in external letters (“.MT
5”). A placement of 2 was supported by DWB mm but is not by
groff mm.
A second argument increases the indentation by indentation and
reduces the line length by twice this amount. A scaling unit of
ens is assumed. The default is 0.
AST [caption]
Set the caption above the abstract to caption, or clear it if
there is no argument. The default is “ABSTRACT”.
AT title ...
Specify author's title(s). If present, AT must appear just af‐
ter the corresponding author's AU. Each title occupies an out‐
put line beneath the author's name in the signature block used
by LT letters (see SG) and in MT memoranda. The ms cover sheet
style also uses it.
AU [name [initials [loc [dept [ext [room [arg1 [arg2 [arg3]]]]]]]]]
Specify author. AU terminates a document title started with TL,
and can be called without arguments for that purpose. Author
information is used by cover sheets, MT memoranda, and SG. Fur‐
ther arguments comprise initials, location, department, tele‐
phone extension, room number or name, and up to three additional
items. Repeat AU to identify multiple authors.
Use WA/WE instead to identify the author for documents employing
LT.
AV [name [1]]
Format approval lines for a handwritten signature and date. Two
horizontal rules are drawn, with the specified name and the text
of the string Letdate beneath them. Above these rules, the text
in the string Letapp is formatted; a second argument replaces
this text with a blank line. See LT.
AVL [name]
As AV, but the date, date rule, and approval notation Letapp are
omitted.
B [bold-text [previous-font-text]] ...
Join bold-text in boldface with previous-font-text in the previ‐
ous font, without space between the arguments. If no arguments,
switch font to bold style.
B1 Begin boxed, kept display. The text is indented one character,
and the right margin is one character shorter. This is a GNU
extension.
B2 End boxed, kept display. This is a GNU extension.
BE End bottom block; see BS.
BI [bold-text [italic-text]] ...
Join bold-text in boldface with italic-text in italics, without
space between the arguments.
BL [text-indent [1]]
Begin bulleted list. Items are prefixed with a bullet and a
space. A text-indent argument overrides register Pi. A second
argument suppresses blank lines between items. Use LI to de‐
clare list items, and LE to end the list.
BR [bold-text [roman-text]] ...
Join bold-text in boldface with roman-text in roman style, with‐
out space between the arguments.
BS Begin bottom block. Input is collected until BE is called, and
output between the footnote area and footer of each page.
BVL [text-indent [mark-indent [1]]]
Begin broken variable-item (or “tagged”) list. Each item is ex‐
pected to supply its own mark. The line is always broken after
the mark; contrast VL. text-indent sets the indentation of the
text, and mark-indent the distance from the current list inden‐
tation to the mark. A third argument suppresses the blank line
that normally precedes each list item. Use LI to declare list
items, and LE to end the list.
COVER [style]
Begin a cover page description. COVER must appear before the
body text (or main matter) of a document. The argument style is
used to construct the file name /usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/mm/
style.cov and load it with the mso request. The default style
is ms; the ms.cov file prepares a cover page resembling those of
the ms package. A .cov file must define a COVEND macro, which a
document must call at the end of the cover description. Use
cover description macros in the following order; only TL and AU
are required.
.COVER
.TL
.AF
.AU
.AT
.AS
.AE
.COVEND
COVEND End the cover description.
DE End static or floating display begun with DS or DF.
DF [format [fill [right-indentation]]]
Begin floating display. A floating display is saved in a queue
and output in the order entered. Arguments are handled as in
DS. Floating displays cannot be nested. Placement of floating
displays is controlled by the registers De and Df.
DL [text-indent [1]]
Begin dashed list. Items are prefixed with an em dash and a
space. A text-indent argument overrides register Pi. A second
argument suppresses blank lines between items. Use LI to de‐
clare list items, and LE to end the list.
DS [format [fill [right-indentation]]]
Begin static display. Input until DE is called is collected
into a display. The display is output on a single page unless
it is taller than the height of the page. DS can be nested
(contrast with DF).
tab(@); Lf(BI) Lb L Lx. format@Effect none@Do not indent the
display. L@Do not indent the display. I@T{ Indent text by
\n[Si]. T} C@Center each line. CB@Center the whole display as
a block. R@Right-adjust the lines. RB@Right-adjust the whole
display as a block.
The values “L”, “I”, “C”, and “CB” can also be specified as “0”,
“1”, “2”, and “3”, respectively, for compatibility with DWB mm.
tab(@); Lf(BI) Lb L Lx. fill@Effect none@Disable filling.
N@Disable filling. F@Enable filling.
“N” and “F” can also be specified as “0” and “1”, respectively,
for compatibility with DWB mm.
A third argument reduces the line length by right-indentation.
mm normally places blank lines before and after the display.
Set register Ds to 0 to suppress these.
EC [title [override [flag [refname]]]]
Caption an equation. The caption consists of the string Liec
followed by an automatically incrementing counter stored in the
register Ec, punctuation configured by the register Of, then ti‐
tle (if any). Use the af request to configure Ec's number for‐
mat. override and flag alter the equation number as follows.
Omitting flag and specifying 0 in its place are equivalent.
tab(@); Lf(BI) Lb L Lx. flag@Effect 0@T{ Prefix number with
override. T} 1@T{ Suffix number with override. T} 2@T{ Replace
number with override. T}
Equation captions are centered irrespective of the alignment of
any enclosing display.
refname stores the equation number using SETR; it can be re‐
treived with “.GETST refname”. This argument is a GNU exten‐
sion.
Captioned equations are listed in a table of contents (see TC)
if the Boolean register Le is true. Such a list uses the string
Le as a heading.
EF ["'left'center'right'"]
Define the even-page footer, which is formatted just above the
normal page footer on even-numbered pages. See PF. EF defines
the string EOPef.
EH ["'left'center'right'"]
Define the even-page header, which is formatted just below the
normal page header on even-numbered pages. See PH. EH defines
the string TPeh.
EN End equation input preprocessed by eqn(1); see EQ.
EOP If defined, this macro is called in lieu of normal page footer
layout. Headers and footers are formatted in a separate envi‐
ronment. See TP.
tab(@); Cb S Lb L. Strings available to EOP _ EOPf@argument to
PF EOPef@argument to EF EOPof@argument to OF
EPIC [-L] width height [name]
Draw a box with the given width and height. It also prints the
text name or a default string if name is not specified. This is
used to include external pictures; just give the size of the
picture. -L left-aligns the picture; the default is to center.
See PIC.
EQ [label]
Start equation input preprocessed by eqn(1). EQ and EN macro
calls bracket an equation region. Such regions must be con‐
tained in displays (DS/DE), except when the region is used only
to configure eqn and not to produce output. If present, label
appears aligned to the right and centered vertically within the
display; see register Eq. If multiple eqn regions occur within
a display, only the last label (if any) is used.
EX [title [override [flag [refname]]]]
Caption an exhibit. Arguments are handled analogously to EC.
The register Ex is the exhibit counter. The string Liex pre‐
cedes the exhibit number and any title. Exhibit captions are
centered irrespective of the alignment of any enclosing display.
Captioned exhibits are listed in a table of contents (see TC) if
the Boolean register Lx is true. Such a list uses the string Lx
as a heading.
FC [closing-text]
Output the string Letfc, or the specified closing-text, as the
formal closing of a letter.
FD [arg [1]]
Configure display of footnotes. The first argument encodes en‐
ablement of automatic hyphenation, adjustment to the right mar‐
gin, indentation of footnote text, and left- vs. right-alignment
of the footnote label within the space allocated for it.
tab(@) nokeep; Lf(BI) Lb Lb Lb Lb L L L L L. arg@Hyphenate?@Ad‐
just?@Indent?@Label alignment 0@no@yes@yes@left
1@yes@yes@yes@left 2@no@no@yes@left 3@yes@no@yes@left
4@no@yes@no@left 5@yes@yes@no@left 6@no@no@no@left
7@yes@no@no@left 8@no@yes@yes@right 9@yes@yes@yes@right
10@no@no@yes@right 11@yes@no@yes@right
An arg greater than 11 is treated as 0. mm's default is 0.
If a second argument, conventionally 1, is given, footnote num‐
bering is reset when a first-level heading is encountered. See
FS.
FE End footnote; see FS.
FG [title [override [flag [refname]]]]
Caption a figure. Arguments are handled analogously to EC. The
register Fg is the figure counter. The string Lifg precedes the
figure number and any title. Figure captions are centered irre‐
spective of the alignment of any enclosing display.
Captioned figures are listed in a table of contents (see TC) if
the Boolean register Lf is true. Such a list uses the string Lf
as a heading.
FS [label]
Start footnote. Input until FE is called is collected into a
footnote. By default, footnotes are automatically numbered
starting at 1; the number is available in register :p and, with
a trailing period, in string F. This string precedes the foot‐
note text at the bottom of the column or page. Footnotes are
vertically separated by the product of registers Fs and Lsp. In
groff mm, footnotes may be used in displays.
A label argument replaces the contents of the string F; it need
not be numeric. In this event, the footnote marker in the body
text must be explicitly written.
GETHN refname [varname]
Include the heading number where the corresponding “.SETR ref‐
name” was placed. This is displayed as “X.X.X.” in pass 1. See
INITR. If varname is used, GETHN sets the string varname to the
heading number.
GETPN refname [varname]
Include the page number where the corresponding “.SETR refname”
was placed. This is displayed as “9999” in pass 1. See INITR.
If varname is used, GETPN sets the string varname to the page
number.
GETR refname
Combine GETHN and GETPN with the text “chapter” and “, page”.
The string Qrf contains the text for the cross reference:
.ds Qrf See chapter \\*[Qrfh], page \\*[Qrfp].
Qrf may be changed to support other languages. Strings Qrfh and
Qrfp are set by GETR and contain the page and heading number,
respectively.
GETST refname [varname]
Include the string saved with the second argument to .SETR.
This is a dummy string in pass 1. If varname is used, GETST
sets it to the saved string. See INITR.
H level [title [suffix]]
Set a numbered section heading at level. mm produces numbered
heading marks of the form a.b.c..., with up to fourteen levels
of nesting. Each level's number increases automatically with
each H call and is reset to zero when a more significant level
is specified. “1” is the most significant or coarsest division
of the document. Text after an H call is formatted as a para‐
graph; calling P is unnecessary.
title specifies an optional title; it must be double-quoted if
it contains spaces. mm appends suffix to title in the body of
the document, but omits it from any table of contents (see TC).
This facility can be used to annotate the heading title with a
footnote. suffix should not interpolate the F string; specify a
footnote mark explicitly. See FS.
Heading behavior is highly configurable. Several registers set
a threshold, where heading levels at or below the threshold
value are handled in one way, and those above it another. For
example, a heading level within the threshold of register Cl is
included in the table of contents (see TC).
Heading layout. Register Ej sets a threshold for page breaking
(ejection) prior to a heading. If not preceded by a page break,
a heading level below the threshold in register Hps is preceded
by the amount of vertical space in register Hps1, and by the
amount in Hps2 otherwise. The Hb register sets a threshold be‐
low which a break occurs after the heading, and register Hs sets
a threshold below which vertical space follows it. If the head‐
ing level is not less than both of these, a run-in heading is
produced; paragraph text follows on the same output line. Oth‐
erwise, register Hi configures the indentation of text after
headings. Threshold register Hc enables the centering of head‐
ings; a heading level below both of the Hb and Hc thresholds is
centered.
Heading typeface and size. The fonts used for heading numbers
and titles at each level are configured by the HF string. The
string HP likewise assigns a type size to each heading level.
The vertical spacing used by headings may be controlled by the
user-definable macros HX and/or HZ.
Heading number format. Registers named H1 through H14 store
counters for each heading level. Their values are printed using
Arabic numerals by default; see HM. The heading levels are
catenated with dots for formatting; to typeset only the deepest,
set the Ht register. Heading numbers are not suffixed with a
trailing dot except when only the first level is output; to omit
a dot in this case as well, clear the H1dot register.
Customizing heading behavior. mm calls hook macros to enable
further customization of headings. (DWB mm called these “ex‐
its”.) They can be used to change the heading's mark (the num‐
bered portion before any heading title), its vertical spacing,
and its vertical space requirements (for instance, to require a
minimum quantity of subsequent output lines). Define hook
macros in expectation of the following parameters. The argument
declared-level is the level argument to H, or 0 for unnumbered
headings (see HU). actual-level is the same as declared-level
for numbered headings, and the value of register Hu for unnum‐
bered headings. title is the corresponding argument to H or HU.
HX declared-level actual-level title
mm calls HX before setting the heading. Your definition
may alter }0, }2, and ;3.
}0 (string)
contains the heading mark plus two spaces if de‐
clared-level is non-zero, and otherwise is empty.
;0 (register)
encodes a position for the text after the heading.
0 means that the heading is to be run in, 1 means
that a break is to occur before the text, and
2 means that vertical space is to separate heading
and text.
}2 (string)
is the suffix that separates a run-in heading from
the text. It contains two spaces if register ;0
is 0, and otherwise is empty.
;3 (register)
contains the vertical space required for the head‐
ing to be typeset. If that amount is not avail‐
able, the page is broken prior to the heading.
The default is 2v.
HY declared-level actual-level title
mm calls HY after determing the heading typeface and
size. It could be used to change indentation.
HZ declared-level actual-level title
mm calls HZ after formatting the heading, just before H
or HU returns. It could be used to change the page
header to include a section heading.
HC [hyphenation-character]
Set hyphenation character. Default value is “\%”. Resets to
the default if called without argument. Hyphenation can be
turned off by setting register Hy to 0 at the beginning of the
file.
HM [arg1 [arg2 [... [arg14]]]]
Set the heading mark style. Each argument assigns the specified
register format (see above) to the corresponding heading level.
The default is 1 for all levels. An explicitly empty argument
also indicates the default.
HU heading-text
Set an unnumbered section heading. Except for a heading number,
it is treated as a numbered heading of the level stored in reg‐
ister Hu; see H.
I [italic-text [previous-font-text]] ...
Join italic-text in italics with previous-font-text in the pre‐
vious font, without space between the arguments. If no argu‐
ments, switch font to italic style.
IA [recipient-name [title]]
Specify the inside address in a letter. Input is collected into
the inside address until IE is called, and then output. You can
specify multiple recipients with empty IA/IE pairs; only the
last address is used. The arguments give each recipient a name
and title. See LT.
IB [italic-text [bold-text]] ...
Join italic-text in italics with bold-text in boldface, without
space between the arguments.
IE End the inside address begun with IA.
IND argument ...
If the Boolean register Ref is true, write an index entry as a
specially prepared roff comment to the standard error stream,
with each argument separated from its predecessor by a tab char‐
acter. The entry's location information is arranged as config‐
ured by the most recent INITI call.
INDP Output the index set up by INITI and populated by IND calls. By
default, INDP calls SK and writes a centered caption interpolat‐
ing the string Index. It then disables filling and calls 2C;
afterward, it restores filling and calls 1C.
Define macros to customize this behavior. INDP calls TXIND be‐
fore the caption, TYIND instead of writing the caption, and
TZIND after formatting the index.
INITI location-type file-name [macro]
Initialize groff mm's indexing system. Argument location-type
selects how the location of each index entry is reported. file-
name populates an internal string used later by INDP.
tab(@); Lf(BI) Lb L Lx. location-type@Entry format N@page num‐
ber H@heading mark B@page number, tab character, heading mark
If macro is specified, it is called for each index entry with
the arguments given to IND.
INITR id
Initialize the cross reference macros. Cross references are
written to the standard error stream, which should be redirected
into a file named id.qrf. mmroff(1) handles this and the two
formatting passes it requires. The first pass identifies cross
references, and the second one includes them.
See SETR, GETPN, and GETHN.
IR [italic-text [roman-text]] ...
Join italic-text in italics with roman-text in roman style,
without space between the arguments.
ISODATE [0]
Use ISO 8601 format for the date string DT used by some cover
sheet and memorandum types; that is, YYYY-MM-DD. Must be called
before ND to be effective. If given an argument of 0, the tra‐
ditional date format for the groff locale is used; this is also
the default.
LB text-indent mark-indent pad type [mark [pre-item-space [pre-list-
space]]]
Begin list. The macros AL, BL, BVL, DL, ML, RL, and VL call LB
in various ways; they are simpler to use and may be preferred if
they suit the desired purpose.
The nesting level of lists is tracked by mm; the outermost level
is 0. The text of each list item is indented by text-indent;
the default is taken from the Li register (in ens). Each item's
mark is indented by mark-indent; the default is 0n. The mark is
normally left-aligned. If pad is greater than zero, mark-indent
is overridden such that pad ens of space follow the mark. type
selects one of six possible ways to display the mark.
tab(@); Lf(BI) Lb L L. type@Output for a mark “x” 1@x. 2@x)
3@(x) 4@[x] 5@<x> 6@{x}
If type is 0 and mark is unspecified, the items are set with a
hanging indent. Otherwise, mark is interpreted as a string
defining the mark. If type is greater than zero, items are au‐
tomatically numbered; mark is interpreted as a register format.
The default type is 0.
The last two arguments manage vertical space. Unless a list's
nesting level is greater than the value of register Ls, its
items are preceded by pre-item-space multiplied by the register
Lsp; the default is 1. LB precedes the list by pre-list-space
multiplied by the register Lsp; the default is 0.
LC [list-level]
Clear list state. Active lists are terminated as if with LE,
either all (the default) or only those from the current level
down to list-level if specified. H calls LC automatically.
LE [1] End list. The current list is terminated. An argument of 1
causes vertical space in the amount of register Lsp to follow
the list.
LI [mark [item-mark-mode]]
Begin a list item. Input is collected into a list item until
the current list is terminated or LI is called again. By de‐
fault, the item's text is preceded by any mark configured by the
current list. If only mark is specified, it replaces the con‐
figured mark. A second argument prefixes mark to the configured
mark; an item-mark-mode value of 1 places an unbreakable space
after mark, while a value of 2 does not (rendering the two adja‐
cent). Also see register Limsp.
LO option [value]
Specify letter options; see LT. Standard options are as fol‐
lows. See IA regarding the inside address and string DT regard‐
ing the date.
tab(@); Lf(BI) Lb L Lx. option@Effect AT@T{ Attention; put con‐
tents of string LetAT and value left-aligned after the inside
address. T} CN@T{ Confidential; put value, or contents of
string LetCN, left-aligned after the date. T} RN@T{ Reference;
put contents of string LetRN and value after the confidental no‐
tation (if any) and the date, aligned with the latter. T} SA@T{
Salutation; put value, or contents of string LetSA, left-aligned
after the inside address and the confidental notation (if any).
T} SJ@T{ Subject; put contents of string LetSJ and value left-
aligned after the inside address and the attention and saluta‐
tion notations (if any). In letter type “SP”, LetSJ is ignored
and value is set in full capitals. T}
LT [style]
Format a letter in the designated style, defaulting to BL (see
below). A letter begins with the writer's address (WA/WE), fol‐
lowed by the date (ND), the inside address (IA/IE), the body of
the letter (P and other general-purpose mm macros), the formal
closing (FC), the signature (SG), and notations (NS/NE). Any of
these may be omitted. Letter options specified with LO add fur‐
ther annotations, which are extensible; see section “Internals”
below.
tab(@); Lf(BI) Lb Lb Lx. style@Description BL@T{ Blocked: the
writer's address, date, formal closing, and signature are in‐
dented to the center of the line. Everything else is left-
aligned. T} SB@T{ Semi-blocked: as BL, but the first line of
each paragraph is indented by 5m. T} FB@T{ Fully blocked:
everything begins at the left margin. T} SP@T{ Simplified: as
FB, but a formal closing is omitted, and the signature is set in
full capitals. T}
MC column-width [gutter-width]
Begin multi-column layout. groff mm creates as many columns of
column-width as the line length will permit. gutter-width is
the interior spacing between columns. It defaults to column-
width/15. 1C returns to single-column layout. MC is a GNU ex‐
tension. See MULB for an alternative.
ML mark [text-indent [1]]
Start a list with the mark argument preceding each list item.
text-indent overrides the default indentation of the list items
set by register Li. If a third argument, conventionally 1, is
given, the blank line that normally precedes each list item is
suppressed. Use LI to declare list items, and LE to end the
list.
MT [type [addressee]]
Select memorandum type. These correspond to formats used by
AT&T Bell Laboratories, where the mm package was initially de‐
veloped, affecting the document layout. Some of these included
a cover page with a caption categorizing the document. groff mm
uses type to construct the file name
/usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/mm/type.MT and load it with the mso
request. Memorandum types 0 to 5 are supported; any other value
of type is mapped to type 6. If type is omitted, 0 is implied.
addressee sets a string analogous to one used by AT&T cover
sheet macros that are not implemented in groff mm.
tab(@); Lf(BI) Lb L L. type@Description 0@normal memorandum; no
caption 1@captioned “MEMORANDUM FOR FILE” 2@captioned “PROGRAM‐
MER'S NOTES” 3@captioned “ENGINEER'S NOTES” 4@released paper
5@external letter
See COVER for a more flexible cover sheet mechanism.
MOVE y-pos [x-pos [line-length]]
Move to a position, setting page offset to x-pos. If line-
length is not given, the difference between current and new page
offset is used. Use PGFORM without arguments to return to nor‐
mal.
MULB cw1 space1 [cw2 space2] ... cwn
Begin alternative multi-column mode. All column widths must be
specified, as must the amount of space between each column pair.
The arguments' default scaling unit is n. MULB uses a diversion
and operates in a separate environment.
MULN Begin next column in alternative column mode.
MULE End alternative multi-column mode and emit the columns.
NCOL Move to the start of the next column (only when using 2C or MC).
Contrast with MULN.
ND [arg]
Set the document's date. mm does not interpret arg; it can be a
revision identifier (or empty).
NE End notation begun with NS; filling is enabled.
nP [type]
Begin a numbered paragraph at heading level two. See P.
NS [code [1]]
Declare notations, typically for letters or memoranda, of the
type specified by code. The text corresponding to code is out‐
put, and filling is disabled until NE is called. Typically, a
list of names or attachments lies within NS/NE. If code is ab‐
sent or does not match one of the values listed under the Letns
string description below, each line of notations is formatted as
“Copy (line) to”. If a second argument, conventionally 1, is
given, code becomes the entire notation and NE is not necessary.
In groff mm, you can set up further notations to be recognized
by NS; see the strings Letns and Letnsdef below.
OF ["'left'center'right'"]
Define the odd-page footer, which is formatted just above the
normal page footer on odd-numbered pages. See PF. OF defines
the string EOPof.
OH ["'left'center'right'"]
Define the odd-page header, which is formatted just below the
normal page header on odd-numbered pages. See PH. OH defines
the string TPoh.
OP Make sure that the following text is printed at the top of an
odd-numbered page. Does not output an empty page if currently
at the top of an odd page.
P [type]
Begin new paragraph. If type is missing or 0, P sets the para‐
graph fully left-aligned. A type of 1 idents the first line by
\[Pi] ens. Set the register Pt to select a default paragraph
indentation style. The register Ps controls the vertical spac‐
ing between paragraphs.
PE Picture end; see pic(1).
PF ["'left'center'right'"]
Define the page footer. The footer is formatted at the bottom
of each page; the argument is otherwise as described in PH. PF
defines the string EOPf. See EF, OF, and EOP.
PGFORM [linelength [pagelength [pageoffset [1]]]]
Set line length, page length, and/or page offset. This macro
can be used for letterheads and similar. It is normally the
first macro call in a file, though it is not necessary. PGFORM
can be used without arguments to reset everything after a MOVE
call. A line break is done unless the fourth argument is given.
This can be used to avoid the page number on the first page
while setting new width and length. (It seems as if this macro
sometimes doesn't work too well. Use the command-line arguments
to change line length, page length, and page offset instead.)
PGNH Suppress header on the next page. This macro must be called be‐
fore any macros that produce output to affect the layout of the
first page.
PH ["'left'center'right'"]
Define the page header, formatted at the top of each page, as
the argument, where left, center, and right are aligned to the
respective locations on the line. A “%” character in arg is re‐
placed by the page number. If the argument is absent, no page
header is set. The default page header is
"''- % -''"
which centers the page number between hyphens and formats noth‐
ing at the upper left and right. Header macros call PX (if de‐
fined) after formatting the header. PH defines the string TPh.
See EH, OH, and TP.
PIC [-B] [-C|-I n|-L|-R] file [width [height]]
Include PostScript document file. The optional -B argument
draws a box around the picture. The optional -L, -C, -R, and
-I n arguments align the picture or indent it by n (assuming a
scaling unit of m). By default, the picture is left-aligned.
Optional width and height arguments resize the picture. Use of
this macro requires two-pass processing; see INITR and
mmroff(1).
PS Picture start; see pic(1).
PY Picture end with flyback. Ends a pic(1) picture, returning the
vertical position to where it was prior to the picture. This is
a GNU extension.
R [roman-text [previous-font-text]] ...
Join roman-text in roman style with previous-font-text in the
previous font, without space between the arguments. If no argu‐
ments, switch font to roman style.
RB [roman-text [bold-text]] ...
Join roman-text in roman style with bold-text in boldface, with‐
out space between the arguments.
RD [prompt [diversion [string]]]
Read from standard input to diversion and/or string. The text
is saved in a diversion named diversion. Recall the text by
writing the name of the diversion after a dot on an empty line.
A string is also defined if string is given. Diversion and/or
prompt can be empty ("").
RF Reference end. Ends a reference definition and returns to nor‐
mal processing. See RS.
RI [roman-text [italic-text]] ...
Join roman-text in roman style with italic-text in italics,
without space between the arguments.
RL [text-indent [1]]
Begin reference list. Each item is preceded by an automatically
incremented number between square brackets; compare AL. text-
indent changes the default indentation. Use LI to declare list
items, and LE to end the list. A second argument, convention‐
ally 1, suppresses the blank line that normally precedes each
list item.
RP [suppress-counter-reset [page-ejection-policy]]
Format a reference page, listing items accumulated within RS/RF
pairs. The reference counter is reset unless the first argument
is 1. Normally, page breaks occur before and after the refer‐
ences are output; the register Rpe configures this behavior, and
a second argument overrides its value. TC calls RP automati‐
cally if references have accumulated.
References are list items, and thus are vertically separated
(see LB). Setting register Ls to 0 suppresses this spacing.
The string Rp contains the reference page caption.
RS [reference-string]
Begin an automatically numbered reference definition. By de‐
fault, references are numbered starting at 1; the number is
available in register :R. Interpolate the string Rf where the
reference mark should be and write the reference between RS/RF
on an input line after the reference mark. If reference-string
is specified, groff ms also stores the reference mark in a
string of that name, which can be interpolated as \*[reference-
string] subsequently.
S [type-size [vertical-spacing]]
Set type size and vertical spacing. Each argument is a groff
measurement, using an appropriate scaling unit and an optional +
or - prefix to increment or decrement the current value. An ar‐
gument of P restores the previous value, C indicates the current
value, and D requests the default. An empty or omitted argument
is treated as P.
SA [mode]
Set or restore the default enablement of adjustment. Specify 0
or 1 as mode to set a document's default explicitly; 1 is as‐
sumed by mm. Adjustment can be temporarily suspended with the
na request. When the H or HU macros are used to format a head‐
ing, or when SA is called without a mode argument, the default
adjustment is restored.
SETR refname [string]
Remember the current heading and page numbers as refname. Saves
string if string is defined. string is retrieved with GETST.
See INITR.
SG [arg [1]]
Signature line. Prints the authors name(s) after the formal
closing. The argument is appended to the reference data,
printed at either the first or last author. The reference data
is the location, department, and initials specified with AU. It
is printed at the first author if the second argument is given,
otherwise at the last. No reference data is printed if the au‐
thor(s) is specified through WA/WE. See section “Internals” be‐
low.
SK [n] Skip n pages. If n is 0 or omitted, the page is broken unless
the drawing position is already at the top of a page. Other‐
wise, n pages, blank except for any headers and footers, are
printed.
SM text [post]
SM pre text post
Format text at a smaller type size, joined with any specified
pre and post at normal size.
SP [lines]
Space vertically. lines can have any scaling factor, like “3i”
or “8v”. Several SP calls in a line only produces the maximum
number of lines, not the sum. SP is ignored also until the
first text line in a page. Add \& before a call to SP to avoid
this.
TAB Reset tab stops to every 5 ens.
TB [title [override [flag [refname]]]]
Caption a table. Arguments are handled analogously to EC. The
register Tb is the table counter. The string Litb precedes the
table number and any title. Table captions are centered irre‐
spective of the alignment of any enclosing display.
Captioned tables are listed in a table of contents (see TC) if
the Boolean register Lt is true. Such a list uses the string Lt
as a heading.
TC [slevel [spacing [tlevel [tab [h1 [h2 [h3 [h4 [h5]]]]]]]]]
Output table of contents. This macro is normally the last
called in the document. It flushes any pending displays and, if
any references are pending (see RS), calls RP. It then begins a
new page with the contents caption, stored in the string Licon,
centered at the top. The entries follow after three vees of
space. Each entry is a saved section (number and) heading title
(see the Cl register), along with its associated page number.
By default, an entry is indented by an amount corresponding to
its heading level and the maximum heading length encountered at
that heading level; if defined, the string Ci overrides these
indentations. Entries at heading levels up to and including
slevel are preceded by spacing vees of space. Entries at head‐
ing levels up to and including tlevel are followed by a leader
and a right-aligned page number. If the Boolean-valued tab ar‐
gument is true, the leader is replaced with horizontal motion in
the same amount. For entries above heading level tlevel, the
page number follows the heading text after a word space. Each
argument h1...h5 appears in order on its own line, centered,
above the contents caption. Page numbering restarts at 1, in
register format “i”. If the Oc register is true, numbering of
these pages is suppressed.
If TC is called with at most four arguments, it calls the user-
defined macro TX (if defined) prior to formatting the contents
caption, and TY (if defined) instead of formatting the contents
caption.
Analogous handling of lists of figures, tables, equations, and
exhibits is achieved by defining TXxx and TYxx macros, where xx
is “FG”, “TB”, “EC”, or “EX”, respectively. Similarly, the
strings Lifg, Litb, Liex, and Liec determine captions for their
respective lists.
TE Table end. See TS.
TH End table heading. It is repeated after page breaks within a
table. See TS. The N argument supported by DWB mm is not im‐
plemented by groff mm.
TL [charging-case-number [filing-case-number]]
Begin document title. Input is collected into the title until
AF or AU is called, and output as directed by the cover page.
charging-case-number and filing-case-number are saved for use in
memorandum types 0 and 5. See MT.
TM number ...
Declare technical memorandum number(s) used by MT.
TP If defined, this macro is called in lieu of normal page header
layout. Headers and footers are formatted in a separate envi‐
ronment. See EOP.
tab(@); Cb S Lb L. Strings available to TP _ TPh@argument to PH
TPeh@argument to EH TPoh@argument to OH
TS [H] Table start. Argument “H” tells mm that the table has a head‐
ing. See TE, TH, and gtbl(1).
VERBON [format [type-size [font]]]
Begin verbatim display, where characters have equal width. for‐
mat controls several parameters. Add up the values of desired
features; the default is 0. On typesetting devices, further ar‐
guments configure the type-size in scaled points, and the face
(font); the default is CR (Courier roman).
tab(@); lb lb l lx. Value@Effect 1@Disable the formatter's es‐
cape character (\). 2@Vertically space before the display.
4@Vertically space after the display. 8@T{ Number output lines;
call formatter's nm request with arguments in string Verbnm. T}
16@T{ Indent by the amount stored in register Verbin. T}
VERBOFF
End verbatim display.
VL [text-indent [mark-indent [1]]]
Begin variable-item (or “tagged”) list. Each item should supply
its own mark, or tag. If the mark is wider than mark-indent,
one space separates it from subsequent text; contrast BVL.
text-indent sets the indentation of the text, and mark-indent
the distance from the current list indentation to the mark. A
third argument suppresses the blank line that normally precedes
each list item. Use LI to declare list items, and LE to end the
list.
VM [-T] [top [bottom]]
Vertical margin. Increase the top and bottom margin by top and
bottom, respectively. If option -T is specified, set those mar‐
gins to top and bottom. If no argument is given, reset the mar‐
gin to zero, or to the default (“7v 5v”) if -T is used. It is
highly recommended that macros TP and/or EOP are defined if us‐
ing -T and setting top and/or bottom margin to less than the de‐
fault. This undocumented DWB mm macro is exposed by groff mm to
increase user control of page layout.
WA [writer's-name [title]]
Specify the writer(s) of an LT letter. Input is collected into
the writer's address until WA is called, and then output. You
can specify multiple writers with empty WA/WE pairs; only the
last address is used. The arguments give each writer a name and
title.
WC [format ...]
Control width of footnotes and displays.
tab(@); Lf(BI) Lb Lb Lx. format@Effect N@T{ equivalent to “-WF
-FF -WD” (default) T} WF@T{ set footnotes at full line length,
even in two-column mode T} -WF@T{ set footnotes using column
line length T} FF@T{ apply width of first footnote to encoun‐
tered to subsequent ones T} -FF@T{ footnote width determined by
WF and -WF T} WD@T{ set displays at full line length, even in
two-column mode T} -WD@T{ set displays using column line length
T}
WE End the writer's address begun with WA.
Strings
Many mm strings interpolate predefined, localizable text. These are
presented in quotation marks.
App “APPENDIX”
Apptxt stores the title argument to the last APP call.
BU interpolates a bullet (see BL).
Ci is a list of indentation amounts to use for table of contents
heading levels, overriding their automatic computation. Each
word must be a horizontal measurement (like “1i”) and is mapped
one-to-one to heading levels 1, 2, and so on.
DT The date; set by the ND macro (defaults to the date the document
is formatted). The format is the conventional one for the groff
locale, but see the ISODATE macro and Iso register.
EM interpolates an em dash.
F interpolates an automatically numbered footnote marker; the num‐
ber is used by the next FS call without an argument. In troff
mode, the marker is superscripted; in nroff mode, it is sur‐
rounded by square brackets.
H1txt Updated by .H and .HU to the current heading text. Also updated
in table of contents & friends.
HF assigns font identifiers, separated by spaces, to heading levels
in one-to-one correspondence. Each identifier may be a font
mounting position, font name, or style name. Omitted values are
assumed to be 1. The default is “2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2 2”,
which places all headings in italics. DWB mm's default was “3 3
2 2 2 2 2”.
HP assigns type sizes, separated by spaces, to heading levels in
one-to-one correspondence. Each size is interpreted in scaled
points; zero values are translated to 10. Omitted values are
assumed to be 0 (and are translated accordingly). The default
is “0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0”.
Index “INDEX”
Le “LIST OF EQUATIONS”
Letfc “Yours very truly,” (see FC)
Letapp “APPROVED:” (see AV)
LetAT “ATTENTION:” (see LO)
LetCN “CONFIDENTIAL” (see LO)
Letdate
“Date” (see AV)
Letns is a group of strings structuring the notations produced by NS.
If the code argument to NS has no corresponding string, the no‐
tation is included between parentheses, prefixed with
Letns!copy, and suffixed with Letns!to. Observe the spaces af‐
ter “Copy” and before “to”.
tab(@); Lb Lb Lb L L L. NS code@String@Contents 0@Letns!0@Copy
to 1@Letns!1@Copy (with att.) to 2@Letns!2@Copy (without att.)
to 3@Letns!3@Att. 4@Letns!4@Atts. 5@Letns!5@Enc.
6@Letns!6@Encs. 7@Letns!7@Under separate cover 8@Letns!8@Letter
to 9@Letns!9@Memorandum to 10@Letns!10@Copy (with atts.) to
11@Letns!11@Copy (without atts.) to 12@Letns!12@Abstract Only to
13@Letns!13@Complete Memorandum to 14@Letns!14@CC
—@Letns!copy@Copy (with trailing space) —@Letns!to@ to (note
leading space)
Letnsdef
Select the notation format used by NS when it is given no argu‐
ment. The default is “0”.
LetRN “In reference to:” (see LO)
LetSA “To Whom It May Concern:” (see LO)
LetSJ “SUBJECT:” (see LO)
Lf “LIST OF FIGURES”
Licon “CONTENTS”
Liec “Equation”
Liex “Exhibit”
Lifg “Figure”
Litb “TABLE”
Lt “LIST OF TABLES”
Lx “LIST OF EXHIBITS”
MO1...MO12
“January” through “December”
Qrf “See chapter \\*[Qrfh], page \\n[Qrfp].”
Rf interpolates an automatically numbered reference mark; the num‐
ber is used by the next RS call. In troff mode, the marker is
superscripted; in nroff mode, it is surrounded by square brack‐
ets.
Rp “REFERENCES”
Sm interpolates ℠, the service mark sign.
Tcst interpolates an indicator of the TC macro's processing status.
If TC is not operating, it is empty. User-defined TP or EOP
macros might condition page headers or footers on its contents.
tab(@); lb lb l l. Value@Meaning co@Table of contents fg@List
of figures tb@List of tables ec@List of equations ex@List of ex‐
hibits ap@Appendix
Tm interpolates ™, the trade mark sign.
Verbnm supplies argument(s) to the nm request employed by the VERBON
macro. The default is “1”.
Registers
Default register values, where meaningful, are shown in parentheses.
Many are also marked as Boolean-valued, meaning that they are consid‐
ered “true” (on, enabled) when they have a positive value, and “false”
(off, disabled) otherwise.
.mgm indicates that groff mm is in use (Boolean-valued; 1).
:p is an auto-incrementing footnote counter; see FS.
:R is an auto-incrementing reference counter; see RS.
Aph formats an appendix heading (and title, if supplied); see APP
(Boolean-valued; 1).
Au includes supplemental author information (the third and subse‐
quent arguments to AU) in memorandum “from” information; see
COVER and MT (Boolean-valued; 1).
Cl sets the threshold for inclusion of headings in a table of con‐
tents. Headings at levels above this value are excluded; see H
and TC (2). The Cl register controls whether a heading is saved
for output in the table of contents at the time H or HU is
called; if you change Cl's value immediately prior to calling
TC, you are unlikely to get the result you want.
Cp suppresses page breaks before lists of captioned equations, ex‐
hibits, figures, and tables, and before an index; see EC, EX,
FG, TB, and INDP (Boolean-valued; 0).
D produces debugging information for the mm package on the stan‐
dard error stream. A value of 0 outputs nothing; 1 reports for‐
matting progress. Higher values communicate internal state in‐
formation of increasing verbosity (0).
De causes a page break after a floating display is output; see DF
(Boolean-valued; 0).
Df configures the behavior of DF. The following values are recog‐
nized; 4 and 5 do not override the De register (5).
tab(@); Lb Lb L Lx. Value@Effect 0@T{ Flush pending displays at
the end of each section when section-page numbering is active,
otherwise at the end of the document. T} 1@T{ Flush a pending
display on the current page or column if there is enough space,
otherwise at the end of the document. T} 2@T{ Flush one pending
display at the top of each page or column. T} 3@T{ Flush a
pending display on the current page or column if there is enough
space, otherwise at the top of the next. T} 4@T{ Flush as many
pending displays as possible in a new page or column. T} 5@T{
Fill columns or pages with flushed displays until none remain.
T}
Ds puts vertical space in the amount of register Dsp (if defined)
or Lsp before and after each static display; see DS (Boolean-
valued; 1).
Dsp configures the amount of vertical space placed before and after
static displays; see DS and register Ds (undefined).
Ec is an auto-incrementing equation counter; see EC.
Ej sets the threshold for page breaks (ejection) prior to the for‐
mat of headings. Headings at levels above this value are set on
the same page and column if possible; see H (0).
Eq aligns an equation label to the left of a display instead of the
right (Boolean-valued; 0).
Ex is an auto-incrementing exhibit counter; see EX.
Fg is an auto-incrementing figure counter; see FG.
Fs is multiplied by register Lsp to vertically separate footnotes;
see FS (1).
H1...H14
are auto-incrementing counters corresponding to each heading
level; see H.
H1dot appends a period to the number of a level one heading; see H
(Boolean-valued; 1).
H1h is a copy of A copy of register register H1, but it is incre‐
mented just before a page break. This can be useful in user-de‐
fined macros; see H and HX.
Hb sets the threshold for breaking the line after formatting a
heading. Text after headings at levels above this value are set
on the same output line if possible; see H (2).
Hc sets the threshold for centering a heading. Headings at levels
above this value use the prevailing alignment (that is, they are
not centered); see H (0).
Hi configures the indentation of text after headings. It does not
affect “run-in” headings. The following values are recognized;
see H and P (1).
tab(@); Lb Lb L Lx. Value@Effect 0@no indentation 1@indent per
the paragraph type 2@indent to align with heading title
Hps sets the heading level threshold for application of preceding
vertical space; see H. Headings at levels above the value in
register Hps use the amount of space in register Hps1; otherwise
that in Hps2. The value of Hps should be strictly greater than
that of Ej (1).
Hps1 configures the amount of vertical space preceding a heading
above the Hps threshold; see H (troff devices: 0.5v; nroff de‐
vices: 1v).
Hps2 configures the amount of vertical space preceding a heading at
or below the Hps threshold; see H (troff devices: 1v; nroff de‐
vices: 2v).
Hs sets the heading level threshold for application of succeeding
vertical space. If the heading level is greater than Hs, the
heading is followed by vertical space in the amount of regis‐
ter Hss; see H (2).
Hss is multiplied by register Lsp to produce vertical space after
headings above the threshold in register Hs; see H (1).
Ht suppresses output of heading level counters above the lowest
when the heading is formatted; see H (Boolean-valued; 0).
Hu sets the heading level used by unnumbered headings; see HU (2).
Hy enables automatic hyphenation of words (Boolean-valued; 0).
Iso configures the use of ISO 8601 date format if specified (with
any value) on the command line; see ISODATE. The default is de‐
termined by localization files.
L defines the page length for the document, and must be set from
the command line. A scaling unit should be appended. The de‐
fault is that of the selected groff output device.
Le
Lf
Lt
Lx configure the report of lists of equation, figure, table, and
exhibit captions, respectively, after a table of contents; see
TC (Boolean-valued; Le: 0; Lf, Lt, Lx: 1).
Letwam sets the maximum number of input lines permitted in a writer's
address; see WA and WE (14).
Li configures the amount of indentation in ens applied to list
items; see LI (6).
Limsp inserts a space between the prefix and the mark in automatically
numbered lists; see AL (Boolean-valued; 1).
Ls sets a threshold for placement of vertical space before list
items. If the list nesting level is greater than this value, no
such spacing occurs; see LI (99).
Lsp configures the base amount of vertical space used for separation
in the document. mm applies this spacing to many contexts,
sometimes with multipliers; see DS, FS, H, LI, and P (troff de‐
vices: 0.5v; nroff devices: 1v).
N configures the header and footer placements used by PH. The de‐
fault footer is empty. If “section-page” numbering is selected,
the default header becomes empty and the default footer becomes
“x-y”, where x is is the section number (the number of the cur‐
rent first-level heading) and y the page number within the sec‐
tion. The following values are recognized; for finer control,
see PH, PF, EH, EF, OH, and OF, and registers Sectf and Sectp.
Value 5 is a GNU extension (0).
tab(@); Lb Lb L Lx. Value@Effect 0@Set header on all pages.
1@Move header to footer on page 1. 2@Omit header on page 1.
3@Use “section-page” numbering style on all pages. 4@Omit
header on all pages. 5@T{ Use “section-page” and “section-fig‐
ure” numbering style on all pages. T}
Np causes paragraphs after first-level headings (only) to be num‐
bered in the format s.p, where s is is the section number (the
number of the current first-level heading) and p is the para‐
graph number, starting at 1; see H and P (Boolean-valued; 0).
O defines the page offset of the document, and must be set from
the command line. A scaling unit should be appended. The de‐
fault is .75i on terminal devices. On typesetters, it is .963i
or set to 1i by the papersize.tmac package; see groff_tmac(5).
Oc suppresses the appearance of page numbers in the table of con‐
tents; see TC (Boolean-valued; 0).
Of selects a separator format within equation, exhibit, figure, and
table captions; see EC, EX, FG, and TB. The following values
are recognized; the spaces shown are unpaddable (0).
tab(@); Lb Lb L Lx. Value@Effect 0@". " 1@" — "
P interpolates the current page number; it is the same as regis‐
ter % except when “section-page” numbering is enabled.
Pi configures the amount of indentation in ens applied to the first
line of a paragraph; see P (5).
Pgps causes the type size and vertical spacing set by S to apply to
headers and footers, overriding the HP string. If not set, S
calls affect headers and footers only when followed by PH, PF,
OH, EH, OF, or OE calls (Boolean-valued; 1).
Ps is multiplied by register Lsp to vertically separate paragraphs;
see P (1).
Pt determines when a first-line indentation is applied to a para‐
graph; see P (0).
tab(@); Lb Lb L Lx. Value@Effect 0@never 1@always 2@T{ always,
except immediately after H, DE, or LE T}
Ref is used internally to control mmroff(1)'s two-pass approach to
index and reference management; see INITI and RS (Boolean-val‐
ued; 0).
Rpe configures the default page ejection policy for reference pages;
see RP (0).
tab(@); Lb Lb L Lx. Value@Effect 0@Break the page before and
after the list of references. 1@Suppress page break after the
list. 2@Suppress page break before the list. 3@Suppress page
breaks before and after the list.
S defines the type size for the document, and must be set from the
command line. A scaling unit should be appended; p is typical
(10p).
Sectf selects the “section-figure” numbering style. Its default is 0
unless register N is set to 5 at the command line (Boolean-val‐
ued).
Sectp selects the “section-page” numbering style. Its default is 0
unless register N is set to 3 or 5 at the command line (Boolean-
valued).
Si configures the amount of display indentation in ens; see DS (5).
Tb is an auto-incrementing table counter; see TB.
V defines the vertical spacing for the document, and must be set
from the command line. A scaling unit should be appended; p is
typical. The default vertical spacing is 120% of the type size.
Verbin configures the amount of indentation for verbatim displays when
indentation is selected; see VERBON (5n).
W defines the “width” of the document (that is, the length of an
output line with no indentation); it must be set from the com‐
mand line. A scaling unit should be appended. The default
is 6i or assigned by the papersize.tmac package; see
groff_tmac(5).
Internals
The LT letter macros call further macros depending on the letter type,
with which they are suffixed. It is therefore possible to define addi‐
tional letter types, either in the territory-specific macro file, or as
local additions. LT sets the registers Pt and Pi to 0 and 5, respec‐
tively. The following macros must be defined to support a new letter
type.
let@init_type
LT calls this macro to initialize any registers and other data
needed by the letter type.
let@head_type
formats the letterhead; it is called instead of the usual page
header macro. Its definition should remove the alias let@header
unless the letterhead is desired on subsequent pages.
let@sg_type name title n is-final [SG-arg ...]
SG calls this macro only for letters; MT memoranda have their
own signature processing. name and title are specified through
WA/WE. n is the index of the nth writer, and is-final is true
for the last writer to be listed. Further SG arguments are ap‐
pended to the signature line.
let@fc_type closing
This macro is called by FC, and has the formal closing as the
argument.
LO implements letter options. It requires that a string named Lettype
be defined, where type is the letter type. LO then assigns its second
argument (value) to the string let*lo-type.
Files
/usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/m.tmac
is the groff implementation of the memorandum macros.
/usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/mm.tmac
is wrapper to load m.tmac.
/usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/refer-mm.tmac
implements refer(1) support for mm.
/usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/mm/ms.cov
implements an ms-like cover sheet.
/usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/mm/0.MT
implements memorandum types 0–3 and 6.
/usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/mm/4.MT
implements memorandum type 4.
/usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/mm/5.MT
implements memorandum type 5.
/usr/share/groff/1.23.0/tmac/mm/locale
performs any (further) desired necessary localization; empty by
default.
Authors
The GNU version of the mm macro package was written by Jörgen Hägg ⟨jh@
axis.se⟩ of Lund, Sweden.
See also
MM - A Macro Package for Generating Documents ⟨https://tkurtbond.github
.io/troff/mm-all.pdf⟩, the DWB 3.3 mm manual, introduces the package
but does not document GNU extensions.
Groff: The GNU Implementation of troff, by Trent A. Fisher and Werner
Lemberg, is the primary groff manual. You can browse it interactively
with “info groff”.
groff(1), troff(1), gtbl(1), pic(1), eqn(1), refer(1), groff_mmse(7)
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(7) for descriptions of the following attributes:
box; cbp-1 | cbp-1 l | l . ATTRIBUTE TYPE ATTRIBUTE VALUE = Availabil‐
ity text/groff = Stability Uncommitted
NOTES
Source code for open source software components in Oracle Solaris can
be found at https://www.oracle.com/downloads/opensource/solaris-source-
code-downloads.html.
This software was built from source available at:
https://github.com/oracle/solaris-userland
The original community source was downloaded from:
https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/groff/groff-1.23.0.tar.gz
Further information about this software can be found on the open source
community website at https://www.gnu.org/software/groff.
groff 1.23.0 1 December 2025 groff_mm(7)