TROFF2NULL(1)

💖 NAME 💖

troff2null — convert troff documents to troffcvt internal format

okay so real quick, before anything else: this is a page from your General Commands Manual, section 1, and the star of the show is a little program called troff2null. she takes your troff and turns it into something troffcvt can vibe with. bestie behavior honestly 🫶

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✨ SYNTAX ✨

troff2null [ options ] file ...  ]

yes, that stray ] at the end is literally how it's written. don't touch it. she's perfect. 💅

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🌸 DESCRIPTION 🌸

so here's the tea 🍓: troff2null converts files written in the troff input language and converts them to the troffcvt internal representation. the way she does this is by running your input files through troffcvt first, and then through tc2null. two steps, one slay, that's the pipeline.

troff2null understands the usual troffcvt options — you know, the standard ones, she's fluent. but she also understands these extra ones below, and these are the ones you actually came here for:

• -D — Enable debugging output. she's gonna be loud about what she's doing, and honestly? good for her.
• -E — Cause tc2null to echo token information to stderr as tokens are read from troffcvt. full transparency, tokens just narrating themselves in real time.
• -n — No execution. Just show the commands that troff2null would execute to process the document. a dress rehearsal, not the actual performance ✨
• -p — Don't run the postprocessor (tc2null). just... skip that part entirely. she goes halfway and stops.
• -T title — Specify a title for the document. This can be used for documents that do not contain any recognizable title. If the document does contain a title, it is overridden. so like, you can force a title onto a doc that has none, but heads up: if the doc already has one, yours wins and the original gets absolutely steamrolled. 😭

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👀 SEE ALSO 👀

• troffcvt(1)
• tc2null(1)

the friend group. go say hi. 💜

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🫣 WHO-TO-BLAME 🫣

Paul DuBois, dubois@primate.wisc.edu.

if anything goes weird, that's the icon to contact. not me. 🌈

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💀 BUGS 💀

okay so this one's important, no cap. troff2null uses a set of special macros that tell troffcvt how to generate tc2null-specific output that tc2null uses to recognize NULL structural elements.

⚠️ These macros do not work in compatibility mode. periodt. if you're in compatibility mode, they're just not gonna do the thing, and you will be sad. 😔

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kisses bestie, that's the whole page — this was TROFF2NULL(1) from your General Commands Manual, section 1, brought to you with love and zero regrets 💅🎀✨