Package: perl
Version: 5.8.7-10
Severity: wishlist
When a man page generated by pod2man which includes umlauts is viewed
with man in an xterm, the umlaut is not shown but 'Xe' is displayed
instead. According to Colin Watson, pod2man has some *roff code that
tries to manually place the umlaut. It would be nice if pod2man would
support the predefined :u input character.
15:33 < tbm> Kamion: how can you write umlauts in man pages? pod2man
generates A\*: but that is displayed as 'Ae'
15:38 < tarzeau> tbm: \[:u] gives you an ΓΌ
15:39 < tbm> tarzeau: interesting, thanks. now I wonder if this is a
pod2man bug or if I'm using the wrong element in pod
15:46 < Kamion> tbm: depends on your locale
15:46 < Kamion> A\*: ? is that a typo?
15:47 < Kamion> and what does the pod source look like?
15:48 < tbm> Kamion: pod: Only E<Auml>, E<Ouml>, E<Uuml>, E<auml>, E<ouml>,
E<uuml>
15:48 < tbm> Kamion: man: Only A\*:, O\*:, U\*:, a\*:, o\*:, u\*:
15:49 < Kamion> oh, it's accessing a string variable that pod's defined
15:49 < Kamion> .ds :
\\k:\h'-(\\n(.wu*8/10-\*(#H+.1m+\*(#F)'\v'-\*(#V'\z.\h'.2m+\*(#F'.\h'|\\n:u'\v'\*(#V'
15:49 < Kamion> meh. do I have to decipher that?
15:50 < tbm> Kamion: well, you're the *roff masochist :-P
15:50 < Kamion> that's particularly foul
15:51 < Kamion> it's moving up and drawing the umlaut by hand, I think
15:51 < Kamion> then for devices that can't do that, it does:
15:51 < Kamion> . ds : e
15:51 < Kamion> hence Ae
15:52 < tbm> Kamion: is there a good reason for that, or should I file a
wishlist bug that pod2man should use \[:u]
15:53 < Kamion> \(:u anyway (\[ is a groffism)
15:53 < Kamion> my betting would be that far from all nroffs/troffs have a
predefined :u input character
15:54 < Kamion> it could use \(:u if the 'g' variable is set (i.e. groff)
15:55 < Kamion> that would require some substantial reengineering of the
current accent output methods though
15:55 < Kamion> it's a worthwhile wishlist, I think, but it would probably
have to go to podlators upstream for Russ or somebody to
have a look
15:55 < tbm> Kamion: ok, thanks
-- System Information:
Debian Release: testing/unstable
APT prefers unstable
APT policy: (500, 'unstable')
Architecture: i386 (i686)
Shell: /bin/sh linked to /bin/bash
Kernel: Linux 2.6.12-1-686
Locale: LANG=en_US.UTF-8, LC_CTYPE=en_US.UTF-8 (charmap=UTF-8)
Versions of packages perl depends on:
ii libc6 2.3.5-9 GNU C Library: Shared libraries an
ii libdb4.3 4.3.29-3 Berkeley v4.3 Database Libraries [
ii libgdbm3 1.8.3-2 GNU dbm database routines (runtime
ii perl-base 5.8.7-10 The Pathologically Eclectic Rubbis
ii perl-modules 5.8.7-10 Core Perl modules
Versions of packages perl recommends:
ii perl-doc 5.8.7-10 Perl documentation
-- no debconf information
--
Martin Michlmayr
http://www.cyrius.com/
