# doctools(3tcl) 1.6.1 doctools "Documentation tools"

## Name

doctools - doctools - Processing documents

## Synopsis

- package require Tcl 8.5 9
- package require doctools ?1.6.1?

- ::doctools::new objectName ?option value...?
- ::doctools::help
- ::doctools::search path
- objectName method ?arg arg ...?
- objectName configure
- objectName configure option
- objectName configure -option value...
- objectName cget -option
- objectName destroy
- objectName format text
- objectName map symbolic actual
- objectName parameters
- objectName search path
- objectName setparam name value
- objectName warnings

## Description

This package provides a class for the creation of objects able to process and convert text written in the doctools markup language into any output format X for which a formatting engine is available.

A reader interested in the markup language itself should start with the doctools language introduction and proceed from there to the formal specifications, i.e. the doctools language syntax and the doctools language command reference.

If on the other hand the reader wishes to write her own formatting engine for some format, i.e. is a plugin writer then reading and understanding the doctools plugin API reference is an absolute necessity, as that document specifies the interaction between this package and its plugins, i.e. the formatting engines, in detail.

## PUBLIC API

### PACKAGE COMMANDS

::doctools::new objectName ?option value...?

  This command creates a new doctools object with an associated Tcl command whose name is objectName. This object command is explained in full detail in the sections OBJECT COMMAND and OBJECT METHODS. The object command will be created under the current namespace if the objectName is not fully qualified, and in the specified namespace otherwise.

  The options and their values coming after the name of the object are used to set the initial configuration of the object.

::doctools::help

  This is a convenience command for applications wishing to provide their user with a short description of the available formatting commands and their meanings. It returns a string containing a standard help text.

::doctools::search path

  Whenever an object created by this the package has to map the name of a format to the file containing the code for its formatting engine it will search for the file in a number of directories stored in a list. See section FORMAT MAPPING for more explanations.

  This list not only contains three default directories which are declared by the package itself, but is also extensible user of the package. This command is the means to do so. When given a path to an existing and readable directory it will prepend that directory to the list of directories to search. This means that the path added last is later searched through first.

  An error will be thrown if the path either does not exist, is not a directory, or is not readable.

### OBJECT COMMAND

All commands created by ::doctools::new have the following general form and may be used to invoke various operations on their doctools converter object.

objectName method ?arg arg ...?

  The method method and its arg'uments determine the exact behavior of the command. See section OBJECT METHODS for the detailed specifications.

### OBJECT METHODS

objectName configure

  The method returns a list of all known options and their current values when called without any arguments.

objectName configure option

  The method behaves like the method cget when called with a single argument and returns the value of the option specified by said argument.

objectName configure -option value...

  The method reconfigures the specified options of the object, setting them to the associated values, when called with an even number of arguments, at least two.

  The legal options are described in the section OBJECT CONFIGURATION.

objectName cget -option

  This method expects a legal configuration option as argument and will return the current value of that option for the object the method was invoked for.

  The legal configuration options are described in section OBJECT CONFIGURATION.

objectName destroy

  This method destroys the object it is invoked for.

objectName format text

  This method runs the text through the configured formatting engine and returns the generated string as its result. An error will be thrown if no -format was configured for the object.

  The method assumes that the text is in doctools format as specified in the companion document doctools_fmt. Errors will be thrown otherwise.

objectName map symbolic actual

  This methods add one entry to the per-object mapping from symbolic filenames to the actual uris. The object just stores this mapping and makes it available to the configured formatting engine through the command dt_fmap. This command is described in more detail in the doctools plugin API reference which specifies the interaction between the objects created by this package and doctools formatting engines.

objectName parameters

  This method returns a list containing the names of all engine parameters provided by the configured formatting engine. It will return an empty list if the object is not yet configured for a specific format.

objectName search path

  This method extends the per-object list of paths searched for doctools formatting engines. See also the command ::doctools::search on how to extend the per-package list of paths. Note that the path entered last will be searched first. For more details see section FORMAT MAPPING.

objectName setparam name value

  This method sets the named engine parameter to the specified value. It will throw an error if the object is either not yet configured for a specific format, or if the formatting engine for the configured format does not provide a parameter with the given name. The list of parameters provided by the configured formatting engine can be retrieved through the method parameters.

objectName warnings

  This method returns a list containing all the warnings which were generated by the configured formatting engine during the last invocation of the method format.

### OBJECT CONFIGURATION

All doctools objects understand the following configuration options:

-file file

  The argument of this option is stored in the object and made available to the configured formatting engine through the commands dt_file and dt_mainfile. These commands are described in more detail in the companion document doctools_api which specifies the API between the object and formatting engines.

  The default value of this option is the empty string.

  The configured formatting engine should interpret the value as the name of the file containing the document which is currently processed.

-ibase file

  The argument of this option is stored in the object and used as the base path for resolution of relative include paths. If this option is not set (empty string) the value of -file is used instead.

  Note that -file and -ibase, while similar looking, are actually very different. The value of -file is used by some engines for the generation of proper relative references between output documents (HTML). As such this is a destination path. The -ibase on the other hand is used to resolve relative include paths, and as such deals with source paths.

  The default value of this option is the empty string.

-module text

  The argument of this option is stored in the object and made available to the configured formatting engine through the command dt_module. This command is described in more detail in the companion document doctools_api which specifies the API between the object and formatting engines.

  The default value of this option is the empty string.

  The configured formatting engine should interpret the value as the name of the module the file containing the document which is currently processed belongs to.

-format text

  The argument of this option specifies the format to generate and by implication the formatting engine to use when converting text via the method format. Its default value is the empty string. The method format cannot be used if this option is not set to a valid value at least once.

  The package will immediately try to map the given name to a file containing the code for a formatting engine generating that format. An error will be thrown if this mapping fails. In that case a previously configured format is left untouched.

  The section FORMAT MAPPING explains in detail how the package and object will look for engine implementations.

-deprecated boolean

  This option is a boolean flag. The object will generate warnings if this flag is set and the text given to method format contains the deprecated markup command strong. Its default value is FALSE. In other words, no warnings will be generated.

-copyright text

  The argument of this option is stored in the object and made available to the configured formatting engine through the command dt_copyright. This command is described in more detail in the companion document doctools_api which specifies the API between the object and formatting engines.

  The default value of this option is the empty string.

  The configured formatting engine should interpret the value as a copyright assignment for the document which is currently processed, or the package described by it.

  This information must be used if and only if the engine is unable to find any copyright assignments within the document itself. Such are specified by the formatting command copyright. This command is described in more detail in the companion document doctools_fmt which specifies the doctools format itself.

### FORMAT MAPPING

The package and object will perform the following algorithm when trying to map a format name foo to a file containing an implementation of a formatting engine for foo:

1. If foo is the name of an existing file then this file is directly taken as the implementation.

2. If not, the list of per-object search paths is searched. For each directory in the list the package checks if that directory contains a file "fmt.foo". If yes, then that file is taken as the implementation.

   Note that this list of paths is initially empty and can be extended through the object method search.

3. If not, the list of package paths is searched. For each directory in the list the package checks if that directory contains a file "fmt.foo". If yes, then that file is taken as the implementation.

   This list of paths can be extended through the command ::doctools::search. It contains initially one path, the subdirectory "mpformats" of the directory the package itself is located in. In other words, if the package implementation "doctools.tcl" is installed in the directory "/usr/local/lib/tcllib/doctools" then it will by default search the directory "/usr/local/lib/tcllib/doctools/mpformats" for format implementations.

4. The mapping fails.

## PREDEFINED ENGINES

The package provides predefined engines for the following formats. Some of the engines support parameters. These will be explained below as well.

html

  This engine generates HTML markup, for processing by web browsers and the like. This engine supports four parameters:

  footer

    The value for this parameter has to be valid selfcontained HTML markup for the body section of a HTML document. The default value is the empty string. The value is inserted into the generated output just before the </body> tag, closing the body of the generated HTML.

    This can be used to insert boilerplate footer markup into the generated document.

  header

    The value for this parameter has to be valid selfcontained HTML markup for the body section of a HTML document. The default value is the empty string. The value is inserted into the generated output just after the <body> tag, starting the body of the generated HTML.

    This can be used to insert boilerplate header markup into the generated document.

  meta

    The value for this parameter has to be valid selfcontained HTML markup for the header section of a HTML document. The default value is the empty string. The value is inserted into the generated output just after the <head> tag, starting the header section of the generated HTML.

    This can be used to insert boilerplate meta data markup into the generated document, like references to a stylesheet, standard meta keywords, etc.

  xref

    The value for this parameter has to be a list of triples specifying cross-reference information. This information is used by the engine to create more hyperlinks. Each triple is a list containing a pattern, symbolic filename and fragment reference, in this order. If a pattern is specified multiple times the last occurrence of the pattern will be used.

    The engine will consult the xref database when encountering specific commands and will create a link if the relevant text matches one of the patterns. No link will be created if no match was found. The link will go to the uri file#fragment listed in the relevant triple, after conversion of the symbolic file name to the actual uri via dt_fmap (see the doctools plugin API reference). This file-to-uri mapping was build by calls to the method map of the doctools object (See section OBJECT METHODS).

    The following formatting commands will consult the xref database:

    cmd word

      The command will look for the patterns sa,word, and word, in this order. If this fails if it will convert word to all lowercase and try again.

    syscmd word

      The command will look for the patterns sa,word, and word, in this order. If this fails if it will convert word to all lowercase and try again.

    term word

      The command will look for the patterns kw,word, sa,word, and word, in this order. If this fails if it will convert word to all lowercase and try again.

    package word

      The command will look for the patterns sa,word, kw,word, and word, in this order. If this fails if it will convert word to all lowercase and try again.

    see_also word...

      The command will look for the patterns sa,word, and word, in this order, for each word given to the command. If this fails if it will convert word to all lowercase and try again.

    keywords word...

      The command will look for the patterns kw,word, and word, in this order, for each word given to the command. If this fails if it will convert word to all lowercase and try again.

latex

  This engine generates output suitable for the latex text processor coming out of the TeX world.

list

  This engine retrieves version, section and title of the manpage from the document. As such it can be used to generate a directory listing for a set of manpages.

nroff

  This engine generates nroff output, for processing by nroff, or groff. The result will be standard man pages as they are known in the unix world.

markdown

  This engine generates Markdown markup. This engine supports two parameters:

  header

    The value for this parameter has to be valid selfcontained markdown markup for the body section of a markdown document. The default value is the empty string. The value is inserted into the generated output just before the table of contents.

    This can be used to insert boilerplate header markup into the generated document.

  xref

    The value for this parameter has to be a list of triples specifying cross-reference information.

    The full details of expected syntax and engine-internal use are explained above for the html engine.

null

  This engine generates no outout at all. This can be used if one just wants to validate some input.

tmml

  This engine generates TMML markup as specified by Joe English. The Tcl Manpage Markup Language is a derivate of XML.

wiki

  This engine generates Wiki markup as understood by Jean Claude Wippler's wikit application.

## Bugs, Ideas, Feedback

This document, and the package it describes, will undoubtedly contain bugs and other problems. Please report such in the category doctools of the Tcllib Trackers. Please also report any ideas for enhancements you may have for either package and/or documentation.

When proposing code changes, please provide unified diffs, i.e the output of diff -u.

Note further that attachments are strongly preferred over inlined patches. Attachments can be made by going to the Edit form of the ticket immediately after its creation, and then using the left-most button in the secondary navigation bar.

## See Also

doctools_intro, doctools_lang_cmdref, doctools_lang_intro, doctools_lang_syntax, doctools_plugin_apiref

## Keywords

HTML, TMML, conversion, documentation, manpage, markdown, markup, nroff

## Category

Documentation tools

## Copyright

Copyright © 2003-2024 Andreas Kupries <andreas_kupries@users.sourceforge.net>