devnag.1: Some remarks and a patch with editorial changes for this man page

Input file is devnag.1

Output from "mandoc -T lint  devnag.1": (shortened list)

      2 STYLE: whitespace at end of input line
      1 WARNING: skipping paragraph macro

Find trailing whitespace with:
grep -n -e ' $' -e ' \\f.$' -e ' \\"' <man page>

-.-.

Output from
test-nroff -mandoc -t -Kutf8 -ww -z devnag.1: (shortened list)

      2 trailing whitespace [-w trail]

Find trailing whitespace with:
grep -n -e ' $' -e ' \\f.$' -e ' \\"' <man page>

-.-.

Remove space characters (whitespace) at the end of lines.
Use "git apply ... --whitespace=fix" to fix extra space issues, or use
global configuration "core.whitespace".

See more information in the attachment "trailing whitespace".

Number of lines affected is

2

-.-.

Wrong distance (not two spaces, not a new line character (\n)) between
sentences in the input file.

  Separate the sentences and subordinate clauses; each begins on a new
line.  See man-pages(7) ("Conventions for source file layout") and
"info groff" ("Input Conventions").

  The best procedure is to always start a new sentence on a new line,
at least, if you are typing on a computer.

Remember coding: Only one command ("sentence") on each (logical) line.

E-mail: Easier to quote exactly the relevant lines.

Generally: Easier to edit the sentence.

Patches: Less unaffected text.

Search for two adjacent words is easier, when they belong to the same line,
and the same phrase.

  The amount of space between sentences in the output can then be
controlled with the ".ss" request.

Mark a final abbreviation point as such by suffixing it with "\&".

Some sentences (etc.) do not begin on a new line.

Split (sometimes) lines after a punctuation mark; before a conjunction.

  Lines with only one (or two) space(s) between sentences could be split,
so latter sentences begin on a new line.

Use

#!/usr/bin/sh

sed -e '/^\./n' \
-e 's/\([[:alpha:]]\)\.  */\1.\n/g' $1

to split lines after a sentence period.
Check result with the difference between the formatted outputs.
See also the attachment "general.bugs"

[List of affected lines removed.]

14:vowel diacritics and consonant ligatures. The rest of the layout,
23:file .tex. The output filename is optional. If an output filename is
30:was written by Frans J. Velthuis and is currently maintained by Zdenek

-.-.

Only one space character is after a possible end of sentence
(after a punctuation, that can end a sentence).

devnag.1:14:vowel diacritics and consonant ligatures. The rest of the layout,
devnag.1:23:file .tex. The output filename is optional. If an output filename is
devnag.1:30:was written by Frans J. Velthuis and is currently maintained by Zdenek

-.-.

Remove quotes when there is a printable
but no space character between them
and the quotes are not for emphasis (markup),
for example as an argument to a macro.

devnag.1:1:.TH DEVNAG "1" "30 August 2022" "TeX Live"

-.-.

Output from "test-nroff  -mandoc -t -K utf8 -rF0 -rHY=0 -rCHECKSTYLE=0 -ww -z ":

troff:<stdin>:15: warning: trailing whitespace [-w trail]
troff:<stdin>:26: warning: trailing whitespace [-w trail]

-.-

Spelling:

manpage -> man page

-.-

Generally:

Split (sometimes) lines after a punctuation mark; before a conjunction.

-.-

Tables:

  Use the preprocessor 'tbl' to make tables.

  Put data, that are wider than the header in the (centered) last column,
in a "T{...\nT}" block(, when the table gets wider than the output line).

  Table headings, that are wider than any data in the corresponding
column, do not need to be centered, so left adjustment (l, L) is
sufficient.

--- devnag.1	2026-06-03 01:20:39.676441178 +0000
+++ devnag.1.new	2026-06-03 01:40:27.554872623 +0000
@@ -1,10 +1,9 @@
-.TH DEVNAG "1" "30 August 2022" "TeX Live"
+.TH DEVNAG 1 "30 August 2022" "TeX Live"
 .SH NAME
 devnag \- Devanagari for TeX preprocessor
 .SH SYNOPSIS
-.B devnag in[.dn] [out[.tex]]
+.BR "devnag in" [ .dn "] [" out [ .tex ]]
 .SH DESCRIPTION
-.PP
 .B devnag
 is a preprocessor that reads transliterated Devanagari input delimited by
 \\dn and converts it into a form with which TeX is familiar.
@@ -12,7 +11,7 @@ is a preprocessor that reads translitera
 The preprocessor
 handles the details of character placement such as the alignment of
 vowel diacritics and consonant ligatures. The rest of the layout,
-however, must be managed by the user. 
+however, must be managed by the user.
 .PP
 For specification of the format please see the documentation accompanying
 the package.
@@ -23,12 +22,12 @@ The default file extension for an input
 file .tex. The output filename is optional. If an output filename is
 not specified, the preprocessor will name it after the input file.
 .TP
-\fB\-v\fR 
+\fB\-v\fR
 report devnag version
 .SH AUTHORS
 .B devnag
 was written by Frans J. Velthuis and is currently maintained by Zdenek
 Wagner as part of TeX Live <[email protected]>.
 .PP
-This manpage was written by Norbert Preining for Debian GNU/Linux and
+This man page was written by Norbert Preining for Debian GNU/Linux and
 may be used, modified and/or distributed freely by anyone.

  Check the output from "lintian" in the Debian distribution.

  Any program (person), that produces man pages, should check the output
for defects by using (both groff and nroff)

[gn]roff -mandoc -t -ww -b -z -K utf8 <man page>

  To find most trailing spaces use

grep -n -e ' $' -e ' \\f.$' -e ' \\"' <man page>

  The same goes for man pages that are used as an input.

-.-

  For a style guide use

  mandoc -T lint

-.-

  For general input conventions consult the man page "nroff(7)" (item
"Input conventions") or the Texinfo manual about the same item.

-.-

  Any "autogenerator" should check its products with the above mentioned
'groff', 'mandoc', and additionally with 'nroff ...'.

  It should also check its input files for too long (> 80) lines.

  This is just a simple quality control measure.

  The "autogenerator" may have to be corrected to get a better man page,
the source file may, and any additional file may.

-.-

  Common defects:

  Not removing trailing spaces (in in- and output).
  The reason for these trailing spaces should be found and eliminated.

  "git" has a "tool" to point out whitespace,
see for example "git-apply(1)" and git-config(1)")

-.-

  Not beginning each input sentence on a new line.

Line length and patch size should thus be reduced when that has been fixed.

  The script "reportbug" uses 'quoted-printable' encoding when a line is
longer than 1024 characters in an 'ascii' file.

  See man-pages(7), item "semantic newline".

-.-

The difference between the formatted output of the original
and patched file can be seen with:

  nroff -mandoc <file1> > <out1>
  nroff -mandoc <file2> > <out2>
  diff -d -u <out1> <out2>

and for groff, using

\"printf '%s\n%s\n' '.kern 0' '.ss 12 0' | groff -mandoc -Z - \"

instead of 'nroff -mandoc'

  Add the option '-t', if the file contains a table.

  Read the output from 'diff -d -u ...' with 'less -R' or similar.

-.-.

  If 'man' (man-db) is used to check the manual for warnings,
the following must be set:

  The option "-warnings=w"

  The environmental variable:

export MAN_KEEP_STDERR=yes (or any non-empty value)

  or

  (produce only warnings):

export MANROFFOPT="-ww -b -z"

export MAN_KEEP_STDERR=yes (or any non-empty value)

-.-