path: root/gnu/usr.bin/ptx/ptx.texinfo

\input texinfo @c -*-texinfo-*-
@c %**start of header
@setfilename ptx.info
@settitle GNU @code{ptx} reference manual
@finalout
@c %**end of header

@ifinfo
This file documents the @code{ptx} command, which has the purpose of
generated permuted indices for group of files.

Copyright (C) 1990, 1991, 1993 by the Free Software Foundation, Inc.

Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of
this manual provided the copyright notice and this permission notice
are preserved on all copies.

@ignore
Permission is granted to process this file through TeX and print the
results, provided the printed document carries copying permission
notice identical to this one except for the removal of this paragraph
(this paragraph not being relevant to the printed manual).

@end ignore
Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of this
manual under the conditions for verbatim copying, provided that the entire
resulting derived work is distributed under the terms of a permission
notice identical to this one.

Permission is granted to copy and distribute translations of this manual
into another language, under the above conditions for modified versions,
except that this permission notice may be stated in a translation approved
by the Foundation.
@end ifinfo

@titlepage
@title ptx
@subtitle The GNU permuted indexer
@subtitle Edition 0.3, for ptx version 0.3
@subtitle November 1993
@author by Francois Pinard

@page
@vskip 0pt plus 1filll
Copyright @copyright{} 1990, 1991, 1993 Free Software Foundation, Inc.

Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim copies of
this manual provided the copyright notice and this permission notice
are preserved on all copies.

Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of this
manual under the conditions for verbatim copying, provided that the entire
resulting derived work is distributed under the terms of a permission
notice identical to this one.

Permission is granted to copy and distribute translations of this manual
into another language, under the above conditions for modified versions,
except that this permission notice may be stated in a translation approved
by the Foundation.
@end titlepage

@node Top, Invoking ptx, (dir), (dir)
@chapter Introduction

This is the 0.3 beta release of @code{ptx}, the GNU version of a
permuted index generator.  This software has the main goal of providing
a replacement for the traditional @code{ptx} as found on System V
machines, able to handle small files quickly, while providing a platform
for more development.

This version reimplements and extends traditional @code{ptx}.  Among
other things, it can produce a readable @dfn{KWIC} (keywords in their
context) without the need of @code{nroff}, there is also an option to
produce @TeX{} compatible output.  This version does not handle huge
input files, that is, those files which do not fit in memory all at
once.

@emph{Please note} that an overall renaming of all options is
foreseeable.  In fact, GNU ptx specifications are not frozen yet.

@menu
* Invoking ptx::                How to use this program
* Compatibility::               The GNU extensions to @code{ptx}

 --- The Detailed Node Listing ---

How to use this program

* General options::             Options which affect general program behaviour.
* Charset selection::           Underlying character set considerations.
* Input processing::            Input fields, contexts, and keyword selection.
* Output formatting::           Types of output format, and sizing the fields.
@end menu

@node Invoking ptx, Compatibility, Top, Top
@chapter How to use this program

This tool reads a text file and essentially produces a permuted index, with
each keyword in its context.  The calling sketch is one of:

@example
ptx [@var{option} @dots{}] [@var{file} @dots{}]
@end example

or:

@example
ptx -G [@var{option} @dots{}] [@var{input} [@var{output}]]
@end example

The @samp{-G} (or its equivalent: @samp{--traditional}) option disables
all GNU extensions and revert to traditional mode, thus introducing some
limitations, and changes several of the program's default option values.
When @samp{-G} is not specified, GNU extensions are always enabled.  GNU
extensions to @code{ptx} are documented wherever appropriate in this
document.  See @xref{Compatibility} for an explicit list of them.

Individual options are explained later in this document.

When GNU extensions are enabled, there may be zero, one or several
@var{file} after the options.  If there is no @var{file}, the program
reads the standard input.  If there is one or several @var{file}, they
give the name of input files which are all read in turn, as if all the
input files were concatenated.  However, there is a full contextual
break between each file and, when automatic referencing is requested,
file names and line numbers refer to individual text input files.  In
all cases, the program produces the permuted index onto the standard
output.
  
When GNU extensions are @emph{not} enabled, that is, when the program
operates in traditional mode, there may be zero, one or two parameters
besides the options.  If there is no parameters, the program reads the
standard input and produces the permuted index onto the standard output.
If there is only one parameter, it names the text @var{input} to be read
instead of the standard input.  If two parameters are given, they give
respectively the name of the @var{input} file to read and the name of
the @var{output} file to produce.  @emph{Be very careful} to note that,
in this case, the contents of file given by the second parameter is
destroyed.  This behaviour is dictated only by System V @code{ptx}
compatibility, because GNU Standards discourage output parameters not
introduced by an option.

Note that for @emph{any} file named as the value of an option or as an
input text file, a single dash @kbd{-} may be used, in which case
standard input is assumed.  However, it would not make sense to use this
convention more than once per program invocation.

@menu
* General options::             Options which affect general program behaviour.
* Charset selection::           Underlying character set considerations.
* Input processing::            Input fields, contexts, and keyword selection.
* Output formatting::           Types of output format, and sizing the fields.
@end menu

@node General options, Charset selection, Invoking ptx, Invoking ptx
@section General options

@table @code

@item -C
@itemx --copyright
Prints a short note about the Copyright and copying conditions, then
exit without further processing.

@item -G
@itemx --traditional
As already explained, this option disables all GNU extensions to
@code{ptx} and switch to traditional mode.

@item --help
Prints a short help on standard output, then exit without further
processing.

@item --version
Prints the program verison on standard output, then exit without further
processing.

@end table

@node Charset selection, Input processing, General options, Invoking ptx
@section Charset selection

As it is setup now, the program assumes that the input file is coded
using 8-bit ISO 8859-1 code, also known as Latin-1 character set,
@emph{unless} if it is compiled for MS-DOS, in which case it uses the
character set of the IBM-PC.  (GNU @code{ptx} is not known to work on
smaller MS-DOS machines anymore.)  Compared to 7-bit ASCII, the set of
characters which are letters is then different, this fact alters the
behaviour of regular expression matching.  Thus, the default regular
expression for a keyword allows foreign or diacriticized letters.
Keyword sorting, however, is still crude; it obeys the underlying
character set ordering quite blindly.

@table @code

@item -f
@itemx --ignore-case
Fold lower case letters to upper case for sorting.

@end table

@node Input processing, Output formatting, Charset selection, Invoking ptx
@section Word selection

@table @code

@item -b @var{file}
@item --break-file=@var{file}

This option is an alternative way to option @code{-W} for describing
which characters make up words.  This option introduces the name of a
file which contains a list of characters which can@emph{not} be part of
one word, this file is called the @dfn{Break file}.  Any character which
is not part of the Break file is a word constituent.  If both options
@code{-b} and @code{-W} are specified, then @code{-W} has precedence and
@code{-b} is ignored.

When GNU extensions are enabled, the only way to avoid newline as a
break character is to write all the break characters in the file with no
newline at all, not even at the end of the file.  When GNU extensions
are disabled, spaces, tabs and newlines are always considered as break
characters even if not included in the Break file.

@item -i @var{file}
@itemx --ignore-file=@var{file}

The file associated with this option contains a list of words which will
never be taken as keywords in concordance output.  It is called the
@dfn{Ignore file}.  The file contains exactly one word in each line; the
end of line separation of words is not subject to the value of the
@code{-S} option.

There is a default Ignore file used by @code{ptx} when this option is
not specified, usually found in @file{/usr/local/lib/eign} if this has
not been changed at installation time.  If you want to deactivate the
default Ignore file, specify @code{/dev/null} instead.

@item -o @var{file}
@itemx --only-file=@var{file}

The file associated with this option contains a list of words which will
be retained in concordance output, any word not mentioned in this file
is ignored.  The file is called the @dfn{Only file}.  The file contains
exactly one word in each line; the end of line separation of words is
not subject to the value of the @code{-S} option.

There is no default for the Only file.  In the case there are both an
Only file and an Ignore file, a word will be subject to be a keyword
only if it is given in the Only file and not given in the Ignore file.

@item -r
@itemx --references

On each input line, the leading sequence of non white characters will be
taken to be a reference that has the purpose of identifying this input
line on the produced permuted index.  See @xref{Output formatting} for
more information about reference production.  Using this option change
the default value for option @code{-S}.

Using this option, the program does not try very hard to remove
references from contexts in output, but it succeeds in doing so
@emph{when} the context ends exactly at the newline.  If option
@code{-r} is used with @code{-S} default value, or when GNU extensions
are disabled, this condition is always met and references are completely
excluded from the output contexts.

@item -S @var{regexp}
@itemx --sentence-regexp=@var{regexp}

This option selects which regular expression will describe the end of a
line or the end of a sentence.  In fact, there is other distinction
between end of lines or end of sentences than the effect of this regular
expression, and input line boundaries have no special significance
outside this option.  By default, when GNU extensions are enabled and if
@code{-r} option is not used, end of sentences are used.  In this
case, the precise @var{regex} is imported from GNU emacs:

@example
[.?!][]\"')@}]*\\($\\|\t\\|  \\)[ \t\n]*
@end example

Whenever GNU extensions are disabled or if @code{-r} option is used, end
of lines are used; in this case, the default @var{regexp} is just:

@example
\n
@end example

Using an empty REGEXP is equivalent to completely disabling end of line or end
of sentence recognition.  In this case, the whole file is considered to
be a single big line or sentence.  The user might want to disallow all
truncation flag generation as well, through option @code{-F ""}.
@xref{Regexps, , Syntax of Regular Expressions, emacs, The GNU Emacs
Manual}.

When the keywords happen to be near the beginning of the input line or
sentence, this often creates an unused area at the beginning of the
output context line; when the keywords happen to be near the end of the
input line or sentence, this often creates an unused area at the end of
the output context line.  The program tries to fill those unused areas
by wrapping around context in them; the tail of the input line or
sentence is used to fill the unused area on the left of the output line;
the head of the input line or sentence is used to fill the unused area
on the right of the output line.

As a matter of convenience to the user, many usual backslashed escape
sequences, as found in the C language, are recognized and converted to
the corresponding characters by @code{ptx} itself.

@item -W @var{regexp}
@itemx --word-regexp=@var{regexp}

This option selects which regular expression will describe each keyword.
By default, if GNU extensions are enabled, a word is a sequence of
letters; the @var{regexp} used is @code{\w+}.  When GNU extensions are
disabled, a word is by default anything which ends with a space, a tab
or a newline; the @var{regexp} used is @code{[^ \t\n]+}.

An empty REGEXP is equivalent to not using this option, letting the
default dive in.  @xref{Regexps, , Syntax of Regular Expressions, emacs,
The GNU Emacs Manual}.

As a matter of convenience to the user, many usual backslashed escape
sequences, as found in the C language, are recognized and converted to
the corresponding characters by @code{ptx} itself.

@end table

@node Output formatting,  , Input processing, Invoking ptx
@section Output formatting

Output format is mainly controlled by @code{-O} and @code{-T} options,
described in the table below.  When neither @code{-O} nor @code{-T} is
selected, and if GNU extensions are enabled, the program choose an
output format suited for a dumb terminal.  Each keyword occurrence is
output to the center of one line, surrounded by its left and right
contexts.  Each field is properly justified, so the concordance output
could readily be observed.  As a special feature, if automatic
references are selected by option @code{-A} and are output before the
left context, that is, if option @code{-R} is @emph{not} selected, then
a colon is added after the reference; this nicely interfaces with GNU
Emacs @code{next-error} processing.  In this default output format, each
white space character, like newline and tab, is merely changed to
exactly one space, with no special attempt to compress consecutive
spaces.  This might change in the future.  Except for those white space
characters, every other character of the underlying set of 256
characters is transmitted verbatim.

Output format is further controlled by the following options.

@table @code

@item -g @var{number}
@itemx --gap-size=@var{number}

Select the size of the minimum white gap between the fields on the output
line.

@item -w @var{number}
@itemx --width=@var{number}

Select the output maximum width of each final line.  If references are
used, they are included or excluded from the output maximum width
depending on the value of option @code{-R}.  If this option is not
selected, that is, when references are output before the left context,
the output maximum width takes into account the maximum length of all
references.  If this options is selected, that is, when references are
output after the right context, the output maximum width does not take
into account the space taken by references, nor the gap that precedes
them.

@item -A
@itemx --auto-reference

Select automatic references.  Each input line will have an automatic
reference made up of the file name and the line ordinal, with a single
colon between them.  However, the file name will be empty when standard
input is being read.  If both @code{-A} and @code{-r} are selected, then
the input reference is still read and skipped, but the automatic
reference is used at output time, overriding the input reference.

@item -R
@itemx --right-side-refs

In default output format, when option @code{-R} is not used, any
reference produced by the effect of options @code{-r} or @code{-A} are
given to the far right of output lines, after the right context.  In
default output format, when option @code{-R} is specified, references
are rather given to the beginning of each output line, before the left
context.  For any other output format, option @code{-R} is almost
ignored, except for the fact that the width of references is @emph{not}
taken into account in total output width given by @code{-w} whenever
@code{-R} is selected.

This option is automatically selected whenever GNU extensions are
disabled.

@item -F @var{string}
@itemx --flac-truncation=@var{string}

This option will request that any truncation in the output be reported
using the string @var{string}.  Most output fields theoretically extend
towards the beginning or the end of the current line, or current
sentence, as selected with option @code{-S}.  But there is a maximum
allowed output line width, changeable through option @code{-w}, which is
further divided into space for various output fields.  When a field has
to be truncated because cannot extend until the beginning or the end of
the current line to fit in the, then a truncation occurs.  By default,
the string used is a single slash, as in @code{-F /}.

@var{string} may have more than one character, as in @code{-F ...}.
Also, in the particular case @var{string} is empty (@code{-F ""}),
truncation flagging is disabled, and no truncation marks are appended in
this case.

As a matter of convenience to the user, many usual backslashed escape
sequences, as found in the C language, are recognized and converted to
the corresponding characters by @code{ptx} itself.

@item -M @var{string}
@itemx --macro-name=@var{string}

Select another @var{string} to be used instead of @samp{xx}, while
generating output suitable for @code{nroff}, @code{troff} or @TeX{}.

@item -O
@itemx --format=roff

Choose an output format suitable for @code{nroff} or @code{troff}
processing.  Each output line will look like:

@example
.xx "@var{tail}" "@var{before}" "@var{keyword_and_after}" "@var{head}" "@var{ref}"
@end example

so it will be possible to write an @samp{.xx} roff macro to take care of
the output typesetting.  This is the default output format when GNU
extensions are disabled.  Option @samp{-M} might be used to change
@samp{xx} to another macro name.

In this output format, each non-graphical character, like newline and
tab, is merely changed to exactly one space, with no special attempt to
compress consecutive spaces.  Each quote character: @kbd{"} is doubled
so it will be correctly processed by @code{nroff} or @code{troff}.

@item -T
@itemx --format=tex

Choose an output format suitable for @TeX{} processing.  Each output
line will look like:

@example
\xx @{@var{tail}@}@{@var{before}@}@{@var{keyword}@}@{@var{after}@}@{@var{head}@}@{@var{ref}@}
@end example

@noindent
so it will be possible to write write a @code{\xx} definition to take
care of the output typesetting.  Note that when references are not being
produced, that is, neither option @code{-A} nor option @code{-r} is
selected, the last parameter of each @code{\xx} call is inhibited.
Option @samp{-M} might be used to change @samp{xx} to another macro
name.

In this output format, some special characters, like @kbd{$}, @kbd{%},
@kbd{&}, @kbd{#} and @kbd{_} are automatically protected with a
backslash.  Curly brackets @kbd{@{}, @kbd{@}} are also protected with a
backslash, but also enclosed in a pair of dollar signs to force
mathematical mode.  The backslash itself produces the sequence
@code{\backslash@{@}}.  Circumflex and tilde diacritics produce the
sequence @code{^\@{ @}} and @code{~\@{ @}} respectively.  Other
diacriticized characters of the underlying character set produce an
appropriate @TeX{} sequence as far as possible.  The other non-graphical
characters, like newline and tab, and all others characters which are
not part of ASCII, are merely changed to exactly one space, with no
special attempt to compress consecutive spaces.  Let me know how to
improve this special character processing for @TeX{}.

@end table

@node Compatibility,  , Invoking ptx, Top
@chapter The GNU extensions to @code{ptx}

This version of @code{ptx} contains a few features which do not exist in
System V @code{ptx}.  These extra features are suppressed by using the
@samp{-G} command line option, unless overridden by other command line
options.  Some GNU extensions cannot be recovered by overriding, so the
simple rule is to avoid @samp{-G} if you care about GNU extensions.
Here are the differences between this program and System V @code{ptx}.

@itemize @bullet

@item
This program can read many input files at once, it always writes the
resulting concordance on standard output.  On the other end, System V
@code{ptx} reads only one file and produce the result on standard output
or, if a second @var{file} parameter is given on the command, to that
@var{file}.

Having output parameters not introduced by options is a quite dangerous
practice which GNU avoids as far as possible.  So, for using @code{ptx}
portably between GNU and System V, you should pay attention to always
use it with a single input file, and always expect the result on
standard output.  You might also want to automatically configure in a
@samp{-G} option to @code{ptx} calls in products using @code{ptx}, if
the configurator finds that the installed @code{ptx} accepts @samp{-G}.

@item
The only options available in System V @code{ptx} are options @samp{-b},
@samp{-f}, @samp{-g}, @samp{-i}, @samp{-o}, @samp{-r}, @samp{-t} and
@samp{-w}.  All other options are GNU extensions and are not repeated in
this enumeration.  Moreover, some options have a slightly different
meaning when GNU extensions are enabled, as explained below.

@item
By default, concordance output is not formatted for @code{troff} or
@code{nroff}.  It is rather formatted for a dumb terminal.  @code{troff}
or @code{nroff} output may still be selected through option @code{-O}.

@item
Unless @code{-R} option is used, the maximum reference width is
subtracted from the total output line width.  With GNU extensions
disabled, width of references is not taken into account in the output
line width computations.

@item
All 256 characters, even @kbd{NUL}s, are always read and processed from
input file with no adverse effect, even if GNU extensions are disabled.
However, System V @code{ptx} does not accept 8-bit characters, a few
control characters are rejected, and the tilda @kbd{~} is condemned.

@item
Input line length is only limited by available memory, even if GNU
extensions are disabled.  However, System V @code{ptx} processes only
the first 200 characters in each line.

@item
The break (non-word) characters default to be every character except all
letters of the underlying character set, diacriticized or not.  When GNU
extensions are disabled, the break characters default to space, tab and
newline only.

@item
The program makes better use of output line width.  If GNU extensions
are disabled, the program rather tries to imitate System V @code{ptx},
but still, there are some slight disposition glitches this program does
not completely reproduce.

@item
The user can specify both an Ignore file and an Only file.  This is not
allowed with System V @code{ptx}.

@end itemize

@bye