Name: Anonymous 2009-04-20 13:47
NAMING
Classical roff systems were designed before the
conventions of the modern C getopt(3) call evolved,
and used a naming scheme for macro packages that
looks odd to modern eyes. Macro packages were
always included with the option -m; when this
option was directly followed by its argument with‐
out an intervening space, this looked like a long
option preceded by a single minus — a sensation in
the computer stone age. To make this invocation
form work, classical troff macro packages used
names that started with the letter `m', which was
omitted in the naming of the macro file.
Classical roff systems were designed before the
conventions of the modern C getopt(3) call evolved,
and used a naming scheme for macro packages that
looks odd to modern eyes. Macro packages were
always included with the option -m; when this
option was directly followed by its argument with‐
out an intervening space, this looked like a long
option preceded by a single minus — a sensation in
the computer stone age. To make this invocation
form work, classical troff macro packages used
names that started with the letter `m', which was
omitted in the naming of the macro file.