Clear, as always. Thanks Chris. On Feb 9, 2012, at 5:00 PM, Chris Blouch wrote:
> Right. Postscript is a language created by Adobe for resolution independent > page layout. It was first used by Apple in laser printers where the > resolution had become so high that it was not reasonable to download an > entire bitmap for a page. Instead Postscript lets you define objects such as > a circle via a center point and a radius to make an "O" or the like. Needless > to say Postscript is a whole giant complex language unto itself, groff knows > how to create it and Preview knows how to interpret it. Postscript is also > what makes a PDF work under the hood. PDF containers add things like fonts, > images, indexing, links and more but the basic page layout is postscript. > > CB > > On 2/9/12 10:07 AM, Paul Erkens wrote: >> Hi CB, >> And now this is clear as well. Thanks a bundle. So what groff does is take >> man's output, in whatever format man outputs it, and then reformats that >> into postscript, whatever that is. I'll be reading. >> Paul. >> On Feb 9, 2012, at 4:00 PM, Chris Blouch wrote: >> >>> Didn't see an answer yet so let me try. >>> >>> 1. man -t routes the output of the man page through groff which defaults to >>> making it into Postscript and then Jonathan piped that postscript into the >>> OSX Preview app. Gives you a nice formatted output in a more Mac friendly >>> viewer. >>> >>> 2. I think most of your question will be answered if you do a "man open". >>> The open command opens some file just as though you had done an Command-O >>> in the finder on it. The -a modifier specifies which application to use to >>> open the file and the -f option tells it to read input from standard in >>> rather than a file, which would be needed to accept input from the pipe's >>> output. >>> >>> CB >>> >>> On 2/9/12 6:11 AM, Paul Erkens wrote: >>>> Hi Johnathan, >>>> >>>>> Looking at the command you gave: >>>>> man -t bash | open -a preview -f >>>> I have 2 questions. >>>> >>>> 1. man bash or man -t bash. What is groff? From man, I don't become any >>>> wiser. It seems that man -t bash, will have man pass its output to groff, >>>> rather than to stout, while groff in turn, does pass it to stdout with a >>>> lot of modifications. What is it that I see, when I enter man -t? Groff is >>>> a front end for something else that I completely don't understand. >>>> Question here is: what are you doing, using man -t? >>>> >>>> 2. The output from man, traveling through gruff by means of the man -t >>>> option, is then piped into the preview command. So far so good. But what >>>> is the -f preview option for? I googled a lot but where do you find the >>>> preview mac command line options? Question here is: what is -f doing in >>>> preview? >>>> >>>> I understand the -a switch for open. If this were not in place, then the >>>> open command, a mac specific one I know now, would never know where to >>>> look. -a Specifies to look inside the applications folder, wherever that >>>> resides. Can you please answer my 2 questions above? It looks like each >>>> new answer poses new questions, but that will settle down over time I hope. >>>> >>>> Paul. >>>> On Feb 9, 2012, at 4:10 AM, Jonathan C. Cohn wrote: >>>> >>>>> The prompt string is defined in the variable PS1 for the bourne shell. >>>>> I believe that bash (bourne again shell ) also uses this variable. >>>>> Note: you only need to set it, no need to export it to the environment. >>>>> >>>>> First check to verify the shell you are running >>>>> echo$shell >>>>> >>>>> then run a man page on the shell (if you want to get fancy , then code >>>>> like the below should bring up the man page in preview... >>>>> >>>>> man -t bash | open -a preview -f >>>>> >>>>> But then again, google can find man pages, and there is actually a option >>>>> in Google settings to indicate that you want a UNIX man page when you >>>>> enter "man XXX" in the google search bar. >>>>> >>>>> Best wishes, >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> Jonathan C. Cohn >>>>> [email protected] >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> >>>>> On Feb 8, 2012, at 8:54 AM, Paul Erkens wrote: >>>>> >>>>>> Dear list, >>>>>> >>>>>> I am learning to change the terminal prompt. It now includes my machine >>>>>> name and my user name, which is what I want to get rid of. I think that >>>>>> the prompt is contained in an environment variable. I found that I can >>>>>> look at them by using env without parameters, and that works. However, >>>>>> prompt is not in here. Where do I need to look, to find the placeholders >>>>>> string that gives me my prompt? >>>>>> >>>>>> Paul. >>>>>> >>>>>> -- >>>>>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google >>>>>> Groups "MacVisionaries" group. >>>>>> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >>>>>> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >>>>>> [email protected]. >>>>>> For more options, visit this group at >>>>>> http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries?hl=en. >>>>>> >>>>> -- >>>>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >>>>> "MacVisionaries" group. >>>>> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >>>>> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >>>>> [email protected]. >>>>> For more options, visit this group at >>>>> http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries?hl=en. >>>>> >>> -- >>> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >>> "MacVisionaries" group. >>> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >>> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >>> [email protected]. >>> For more options, visit this group at >>> http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries?hl=en. >>> > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "MacVisionaries" group. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > [email protected]. > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/macvisionaries?hl=en. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "MacVisionaries" group. 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