[PATCH 13/31] docs: favor `\[ti]` special character over `~`

"G. Branden Robinson" <[email protected]> Thu, 23 Apr 2026 17:59:03 -0500
Newsgroups	gmane.editors.nano.devel
Message-ID	<20260423225903.w2hplqoqcdxvwicn@illithid>
groff_man_style(7):
   Portability
...
     Exercise restraint with escape sequences as with requests.  Some
     escape sequences are however required for correct typesetting even
     in man pages and usually do not cause portability problems.
     Several of these render glyphs corresponding to punctuation code
     points in the Unicode basic Latin range (U+0020–U+007F) that are
     handled specially in roff input; the escape sequences below must be
     used to render them correctly and portably when documenting
     material that uses them as literals——namely, any of the set ' - \ ^
     ` ~ (apostrophe, dash or hyphen‐minus, backslash, caret, grave
     accent, tilde).
...
     Several special characters are also widely portable.  Except for
     \-, \[em], and \[ga], AT&T troff did not consistently define the
     characters listed below, but its descendants, like DWB, Plan 9, or
     Solaris troff, can be made to support them by defining them in font
     description files, making them aliases of existing glyphs if
     necessary; see groff_font(5).  groff’s extended notation for
     special characters, \[xx], is also supported by mandoc(1), Heirloom
     Doctools troff, and neatroff, but not DWB, Plan 9, or Solaris
     troffs.
...
     \[ti]  Basic Latin tilde.  Some output devices format “~” as U+02DC
            (small tilde).

This change was scripted.

$ sed -i -e 's/~/\\[ti]/g' doc/*.[15]
---
 doc/nano.1   | 6 +++---
 doc/nanorc.5 | 8 ++++----
 2 files changed, 7 insertions(+), 7 deletions(-)

diff --git a/doc/nano.1 b/doc/nano.1
index d275c746..a7e1bb88 100644
--- a/doc/nano.1
+++ b/doc/nano.1
@@ -136,7 +136,7 @@ .SH OPTIONS
 .TP
 .BR \-B ", " \-\-backup
 When saving a file, back up the previous version of it, using the current
-filename suffixed with a tilde (\fB~\fR).
+filename suffixed with a tilde (\fB\[ti]\fR).
 .TP
 .BI \-C " directory\fR, " \-\-backupdir= directory
 Make and keep not just one backup file, but make and keep a uniquely numbered
@@ -458,8 +458,8 @@ .SH FILES
 for setting its options and syntaxes and key bindings.  Without that
 option, \fBnano\fR reads two configuration files: first the system's
 \fInanorc\fR (if it exists), and then the user's \fInanorc\fR (if it
-exists), either \fI~/.nanorc\fR or \fI$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/nano/nanorc\fR
-or \fI~/.config/nano/nanorc\fR, whichever is encountered first.  See
+exists), either \fI\[ti]/.nanorc\fR or \fI$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/nano/nanorc\fR
+or \fI\[ti]/.config/nano/nanorc\fR, whichever is encountered first.  See
 .BR nanorc (5)
 for more information on the possible contents of those files.
 .P
diff --git a/doc/nanorc.5 b/doc/nanorc.5
index 485787bf..b16945e3 100644
--- a/doc/nanorc.5
+++ b/doc/nanorc.5
@@ -28,8 +28,8 @@ .SH DESCRIPTION
 a small and friendly text editor.  During startup, if \fB\-\-rcfile\fR
 is not given, \fBnano\fR reads two files: first the system-wide settings,
 from \fI/etc/nanorc\fR (the exact path might be different on your system),
-and then the user-specific settings, either from \fI~/.nanorc\fR or from
-\fI$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/nano/nanorc\fR or from \fI~/.config/nano/nanorc\fR,
+and then the user-specific settings, either from \fI\[ti]/.nanorc\fR or from
+\fI$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/nano/nanorc\fR or from \fI\[ti]/.config/nano/nanorc\fR,
 whichever is encountered first.  If \fB\-\-rcfile\fR is given,
 \fBnano\fR reads just the specified settings file.
 .
@@ -105,7 +105,7 @@ .SH OPTIONS
 line is the beginning of a paragraph).
 .TP
 .B set backup
-When saving a file, create a backup file by adding a tilde (\fB~\fR) to
+When saving a file, create a backup file by adding a tilde (\fB\[ti]\fR) to
 the file's name.
 .TP
 .B set backupdir \fIdirectory\fR
@@ -1134,7 +1134,7 @@ .SH FILES
 .I /etc/nanorc
 System-wide configuration file.
 .TP
-.IR ~/.nanorc " or " $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/nano/nanorc " or " ~/.config/nano/nanorc
+.IR \[ti]/.nanorc " or " $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/nano/nanorc " or " \[ti]/.config/nano/nanorc
 Per-user configuration file.
 .TP
 .I /usr/share/nano/*
-- 
2.30.2
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