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GROTTY(1)		    General Commands Manual		     GROTTY(1)

NAME
       grotty -	groff driver for typewriter-like devices

SYNOPSIS
       grotty [	-bBcdfhiouUv ] [ -Fdir ] [ files... ]

       It is possible to have whitespace between the -F	option and its parame-
       ter.

DESCRIPTION
       grotty  translates  the	output	of  GNU	troff into a form suitable for
       typewriter-like devices.	 Normally grotty should	be  invoked  by	 using
       the  groff  command  with  a  -Tascii,  -Tascii8, -Tlatin1, -Tnippon or
       -Tutf8 option on	ASCII based systems, and with -Tcp1047 and  -Tutf8  on
       EBCDIC  based hosts.  If	no files are given, grotty will	read the stan-
       dard input.  A filename of - will also cause grotty to read  the	 stan-
       dard input.  Output is written to the standard output.

       By  default,  grotty  emits  SGR	 escape	sequences (from	ISO 6429, also
       called ANSI color escapes) to change  text  attributes  (bold,  italic,
       colors).	 This makes it possible	to have	eight different	background and
       foreground colors; additionally,	bold and italic	attributes can be used
       at the same time	(by using the BI font).

       The following colors are	defined	in tty.tmac: black, white, red,	green,
       blue,  yellow, magenta, cyan.  Unknown colors are mapped	to the default
       color (which is dependent on the	settings  of  the  terminal;  in  most
       cases, this is black for	the foreground and white for the background).

       Use the -c switch to revert to the old behaviour, printing a bold char-
       acter  c	with the sequence `c BACKSPACE c' and an italic	character c by
       the sequence `_ BACKSPACE c'.  At the same time,	color output  is  dis-
       abled.	The  same  effect  can	be  achieved  by  setting  either  the
       GROFF_NO_SGR environment	variable or using the `sgr' X command (see be-
       low).

       For SGR support,	it is necessary	to use the -R  option  of  less(1)  to
       disable	the  interpretation  of	 grotty's  old	output format.	Conse-
       quently,	all programs which use less as the pager program have to  pass
       this  option  to	 it.   For  man(1) in particular, either add -R	to the
       $PAGER environment variable, e.g.

	      PAGER="/usr/bin/less -R"
	      export PAGER

       or use the -P option of man to set the pager  executable	 and  its  op-
       tions, or modify	the configuration file of man in a similar fashion.

       grotty's	 old  output  format  can be displayed on a terminal by	piping
       through ul(1).  Pagers such as more(1) or less(1) are also able to dis-
       play these sequences.  Use either -B or -U when	piping	into  less(1);
       use -b when piping into more(1).	 There is no need to filter the	output
       through col(1) since grotty never outputs reverse line feeds.

       The font	description file may contain a command

	      internalname n

       where n is a decimal integer.  If the 01	bit in n is set, then the font
       will  be	 treated as an italic font; if the 02 bit is set, then it will
       be treated as a bold font.  The code  field  in	the  font  description
       field  gives the	code which will	be used	to output the character.  This
       code can	also be	used in	the \N escape sequence in troff.

OPTIONS
       -b     Suppress the use of overstriking for bold	 characters.   Ignored
	      if -c isn't used.

       -B     Use only overstriking for	bold-italic characters.	 Ignored if -c
	      isn't used.

       -c     Use  grotty's old	output format (see above).  This also disables
	      color output.

       -d     Ignore  all  \D  commands.   Without  this  grotty  will	render
	      \D'l...'	commands  that have at least one zero argument (and so
	      are either horizontal or vertical) using -, |, and + characters.

       -f     Use form feeds in	the output.  A form feed will be output	at the
	      end of each page that has	no output on its last line.

       -Fdir  Prepend directory	dir/devname to the search path	for  font  and
	      device  description  files; name is the name of the device, usu-
	      ally ascii, ascii8, latin1, utf8,	nippon or cp1047.

       -h     Use horizontal tabs in the output.  Tabs are assumed to  be  set
	      every 8 columns.

       -i     Use escape sequences to set the italic text attribute instead of
	      the  underline  attribute	for italic fonts (`I' and `BI').  Note
	      that most	terminals (including xterm) don't support  this.   Ig-
	      nored if -c is active.

       -o     Suppress overstriking (other than	for bold or underlined charac-
	      ters in case the old output format has been activated with -c).

       -u     Suppress	the use	of underlining for italic characters.  Ignored
	      if -c isn't used.

       -U     Use only underlining for bold-italic characters.	Ignored	if  -c
	      isn't used.

       -v     Print the	version	number.

USAGE
       grotty  understands a single X command produced using the \X escape se-
       quence.

       \X'tty: sgr n'
	      If n is non-zero or missing, enable SGR output (this is the  de-
	      fault), otherwise	use the	old drawing scheme for bold and	under-
	      line.

ENVIRONMENT
       GROFF_NO_SGR
	      If set, the old drawing scheme for bold and underline (using the
	      backspace	character) is active.  Colors are disabled.

FILES
       /usr/local/share/groff/1.18.1/font/devascii/DESC
	      Device description file for ascii	device.

       /usr/local/share/groff/1.18.1/font/devascii/F
	      Font description file for	font F of ascii	device.

       /usr/local/share/groff/1.18.1/font/devascii8/DESC
	      Device description file for ascii8 device.

       /usr/local/share/groff/1.18.1/font/devlatin1/DESC
	      Device description file for latin1 device.

       /usr/local/share/groff/1.18.1/font/devnippon/DESC
	      Device description file for nippon device.

       /usr/local/share/groff/1.18.1/font/devlatin1/F
	      Font description file for	font F of latin1 device.

       /usr/local/share/groff/1.18.1/font/devutf8/DESC
	      Device description file for utf8 device.

       /usr/local/share/groff/1.18.1/font/devutf8/F
	      Font description file for	font F of utf8 device.

       /usr/local/share/groff/1.18.1/font/devcp1047/DESC
	      Device description file for cp1047 device.

       /usr/local/share/groff/1.18.1/font/devcp1047/F
	      Font description file for	font F of cp1047 device.

       /usr/local/share/groff/1.18.1/tmac/tty.tmac
	      Macros for use with grotty.

       /usr/local/share/groff/1.18.1/tmac/tty-char.tmac
	      Additional klugdey character definitions for use with grotty.

       Note that on EBCDIC hosts, only files for the cp1047 device will	be in-
       stalled.

BUGS
       grotty is intended only for simple documents.

       There is	no support for fractional horizontal or	vertical motions.

       There  is no support for	\D commands other than horizontal and vertical
       lines.

       Characters above	the first line (ie with	a vertical position of 0) can-
       not be printed.

       Color handling is different compared to grops(1).  \M doesn't  set  the
       fill  color  for	 closed	 graphic objects (which	grotty doesn't support
       anyway) but changes the background color	of the character cell, affect-
       ing all subsequent operations.

SEE ALSO
       groff(1), troff(1), groff_out(5), groff_font(5),	groff_char(7),	ul(1),
       more(1),	man(1),	less(1)

Groff Version 1.18.1		 12 April 2025			     GROTTY(1)

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