187 lines
5.2 KiB
Groff
187 lines
5.2 KiB
Groff
.\" Copyright (c) 1980, 1990, 1993
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.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved.
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.\"
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.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
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.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
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.\" are met:
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.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
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.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
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.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
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.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the
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.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
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.\" 3. All advertising materials mentioning features or use of this software
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.\" must display the following acknowledgement:
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.\" This product includes software developed by the University of
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.\" California, Berkeley and its contributors.
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.\" 4. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors
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.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software
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.\" without specific prior written permission.
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.\"
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.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND
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.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE
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.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE
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.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE
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.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL
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.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS
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.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION)
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.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT
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.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY
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.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF
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.\" SUCH DAMAGE.
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.\"
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.\" @(#)fmt.1 8.1 (Berkeley) 6/6/93
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.\" $FreeBSD$
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.\"
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.\" Modified by Gareth McCaughan to describe the new version of `fmt'
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.\" rather than the old one.
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.Dd June 25, 2000
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.Dt FMT 1
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.Os
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.Sh NAME
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.Nm fmt
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.Nd simple text formatter
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.Sh SYNOPSIS
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.Nm fmt
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.Op Fl cmnps
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.Op Fl d Ar chars
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.Op Fl l Ar num
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.Op Fl t Ar num
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.Op Ar goal Oo Ar maximum Oc | Fl Ns Ar width | Fl w Ar width
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.Op Ar
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.Sh DESCRIPTION
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The
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.Nm
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utility is a simple text formatter which reads the concatenation of input
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files (or standard input if none are given) and produces on standard
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output a version of its input with lines as close to the
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.Ar goal
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length
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as possible without exceeding the
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.Ar maximum .
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The
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.Ar goal
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length defaults
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to 65 and the
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.Ar maximum
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to 10 more than the
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.Ar goal
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length.
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Alternatively, a single
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.Ar width
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parameter can be specified either by prepending a hyphen to it or by using
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.Fl w .
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For example,
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.Dq Li fmt -w 72 ,
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.Dq Li fmt -72 ,
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and
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.Dq Li fmt 72 72
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all produce identical output.
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The spacing at the beginning of the input lines is preserved in the output,
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as are blank lines and interword spacing.
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Lines are joined or split only at white space; that is, words are never
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joined or hyphenated.
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.Pp
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The options are as follows:
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.Bl -tag -width indent
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.It Fl c
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Center the text, line by line.
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In this case, most of the other
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options are ignored; no splitting or joining of lines is done.
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.It Fl m
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Try to format mail header lines contained in the input sensibly.
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.It Fl n
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Format lines beginning with a
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.Ql \&.
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(dot) character.
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Normally,
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.Nm
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does not fill these lines, for compatibility with
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.Xr nroff 1 .
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.It Fl p
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Allow indented paragraphs.
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Without the
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.Fl p
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flag, any change in the amount of whitespace at the start of a line
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results in a new paragraph being begun.
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.It Fl s
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Collapse whitespace inside lines, so that multiple whitespace
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characters are turned into a single space.
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(Or, at the end of a
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sentence, a double space.)
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.It Fl d Ar chars
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Treat the
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.Ar chars
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(and no others) as sentence-ending characters.
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By default the
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sentence-ending characters are full stop
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.Pq Ql \&. ,
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question mark
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.Pq Ql \&?
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and exclamation mark
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.Pq Ql \&! .
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Remember that some characters may need to be
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escaped to protect them from your shell.
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.It Fl l Ar number
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Replace multiple spaces with tabs at the start of each output
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line, if possible.
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Each
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.Ar number
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spaces will be replaced with one tab.
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The default is 8.
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If
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.Ar number
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is 0, spaces are preserved.
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.It Fl t Ar number
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Assume that the input files' tabs assume
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.Ar number
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spaces per tab stop.
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The default is 8.
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.El
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.Pp
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The
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.Nm
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utility
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is meant to format mail messages prior to sending, but may also be useful
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for other simple tasks.
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For instance,
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within visual mode of the
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.Xr ex 1
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editor (e.g.,
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.Xr vi 1 )
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the command
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.Pp
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.Dl \&!}fmt
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.Pp
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will reformat a paragraph,
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evening the lines.
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.Sh SEE ALSO
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.Xr mail 1 ,
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.Xr nroff 1
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.Sh HISTORY
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The
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.Nm
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command appeared in
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.Bx 3 .
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.Pp
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The version described herein is a complete rewrite and appeared in
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.Fx 4.4 .
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.Sh AUTHORS
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.An Kurt Shoens
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.An Liz Allen
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(added
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.Ar goal
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length concept)
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.An Gareth McCaughan
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.Sh BUGS
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The program was designed to be simple and fast \- for more complex
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operations, the standard text processors are likely to be more appropriate.
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.Pp
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When the first line of an indented paragraph is very long (more than
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about twice the goal length), the indentation in the output can be
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wrong.
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.Pp
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The
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.Nm
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utility is not infallible in guessing what lines are mail headers and what
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lines are not.
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