1PIC(1)                      General Commands Manual                     PIC(1)
2
3
4

NAME

6       pic - compile pictures for troff or TeX
7

SYNOPSIS

9       pic [ -nvCSU ] [ filename ... ]
10       pic -t [ -cvzCSU ] [ filename ... ]
11

DESCRIPTION

13       This manual page describes the GNU version of pic, which is part of the
14       groff document formatting system.  pic compiles  descriptions  of  pic‐
15       tures  embedded  within troff or TeX input files into commands that are
16       understood by TeX or troff.  Each picture starts with a line  beginning
17       with  .PS and ends with a line beginning with .PE.  Anything outside of
18       .PS and .PE is passed through without change.
19
20       It is the user's responsibility to provide appropriate  definitions  of
21       the  PS and PE macros.  When the macro package being used does not sup‐
22       ply such definitions (for example, old versions  of  -ms),  appropriate
23       definitions can be obtained with -mpic: These will center each picture.
24

OPTIONS

26       Options  that  do  not take arguments may be grouped behind a single -.
27       The special option -- can be used to mark the end of  the  options.   A
28       filename of - refers to the standard input.
29
30       -C     Recognize  .PS  and  .PE even when followed by a character other
31              than space or newline.
32
33       -S     Safer mode; do not execute sh commands.  This can be useful when
34              operating on untrustworthy input (enabled by default).
35
36       -U     Unsafe mode; revert the default option -S.
37
38       -n     Don't  use  the  groff extensions to the troff drawing commands.
39              You should use this  if  you  are  using  a  postprocessor  that
40              doesn't  support these extensions.  The extensions are described
41              in groff_out(5).  The -n option also causes pic not to use zero-
42              length lines to draw dots in troff mode.
43
44       -t     TeX mode.
45
46       -c     Be more compatible with tpic.  Implies -t.  Lines beginning with
47              \ are not passed through transparently.  Lines beginning with  .
48              are  passed  through  with  the initial .  changed to \.  A line
49              beginning with .ps is  given  special  treatment:  it  takes  an
50              optional  integer  argument  specifying  the line thickness (pen
51              size) in milliinches; a missing argument restores  the  previous
52              line  thickness;  the  default  line thickness is 8 milliinches.
53              The line thickness thus specified takes effect only when a  non-
54              negative  line  thickness  has  not been specified by use of the
55              thickness attribute or by setting the linethick variable.
56
57       -v     Print the version number.
58
59       -z     In TeX mode draw dots using zero-length lines.
60
61       The following options supported by other versions of pic are ignored:
62
63       -D     Draw all lines using the \D escape sequence.   pic  always  does
64              this.
65
66       -T dev Generate  output  for the troff device dev.  This is unnecessary
67              because the troff output generated by pic is device-independent.
68

USAGE

70       This section describes only the differences between  GNU  pic  and  the
71       original version of pic.  Many of these differences also apply to newer
72       versions of Unix pic.  A complete documentation  is  available  in  the
73       file
74
75              /usr/share/doc/groff/pic.ms
76
77   TeX mode
78       TeX  mode  is enabled by the -t option.  In TeX mode, pic will define a
79       vbox called \graph for each picture.  Use the figname command to change
80       the  name  of  the  vbox.  You must yourself print that vbox using, for
81       example, the command
82
83              \centerline{\box\graph}
84
85       Actually, since the vbox has a height  of  zero  (it  is  defined  with
86       \vtop) this will produce slightly more vertical space above the picture
87       than below it;
88
89              \centerline{\raise 1em\box\graph}
90
91       would avoid this.
92
93       To make the vbox having a positive height and a depth of zero (as  used
94       e.g. by LaTeX's graphics.sty), define the following macro in your docu‐
95       ment:
96
97              \def\gpicbox#1{%
98                 \vbox{\unvbox\csname #1\endcsname\kern 0pt}}
99
100       Now you can simply say \gpicbox{graph} instead of \box\graph.
101
102       You must use a TeX driver that supports the tpic specials, version 2.
103
104       Lines beginning with \ are passed through transparently; a %  is  added
105       to  the  end  of the line to avoid unwanted spaces.  You can safely use
106       this feature to change fonts or to change the value  of  \baselineskip.
107       Anything  else  may  well  produce undesirable results; use at your own
108       risk.  Lines beginning with a period are not given any  special  treat‐
109       ment.
110
111   Commands
112       for variable = expr1 to expr2 [by [*]expr3] do X body X
113              Set variable to expr1.  While the value of variable is less than
114              or equal to expr2, do body and increment variable by  expr3;  if
115              by  is not given, increment variable by 1.  If expr3 is prefixed
116              by * then variable will instead be  multiplied  by  expr3.   The
117              value  of  expr3 can be negative for the additive case; variable
118              is then tested whether it is greater than  or  equal  to  expr2.
119              For  the  multiplicative  case, expr3 must be greater than zero.
120              If the constraints aren't met, the loop isn't executed.   X  can
121              be any character not occurring in body.
122
123       if expr then X if-true X [else Y if-false Y]
124              Evaluate  expr;  if it is non-zero then do if-true, otherwise do
125              if-false.  X can be any character not occurring in  if-true.   Y
126              can be any character not occurring in if-false.
127
128       print arg...
129              Concatenate  the  arguments and print as a line on stderr.  Each
130              arg must be an expression, a position, or text.  This is  useful
131              for debugging.
132
133       command arg...
134              Concatenate  the  arguments  and  pass them through as a line to
135              troff or TeX.  Each arg must be an expression,  a  position,  or
136              text.   This  has a similar effect to a line beginning with . or
137              \, but allows the values of variables to be passed through.  For
138              example,
139
140                     .PS
141                     x = 14
142                     command ".ds string x is " x "."
143                     .PE
144                     \*[string]
145
146              prints
147
148                     x is 14.
149
150       sh X command X
151              Pass  command  to a shell.  X can be any character not occurring
152              in command.
153
154       copy "filename"
155              Include filename at this point in the file.
156
157       copy ["filename"] thru X body X [until "word"]
158       copy ["filename"] thru macro [until "word"]
159              This construct does body once for each  line  of  filename;  the
160              line  is split into blank-delimited words, and occurrences of $i
161              in body, for i between 1 and 9, are replaced by the i-th word of
162              the  line.   If  filename is not given, lines are taken from the
163              current input up to .PE.  If an until clause is specified, lines
164              will  be read only until a line the first word of which is word;
165              that line will then be discarded.  X can be  any  character  not
166              occurring in body.  For example,
167
168                     .PS
169                     copy thru % circle at ($1,$2) % until "END"
170                     1 2
171                     3 4
172                     5 6
173                     END
174                     box
175                     .PE
176
177              is equivalent to
178
179                     .PS
180                     circle at (1,2)
181                     circle at (3,4)
182                     circle at (5,6)
183                     box
184                     .PE
185
186              The  commands  to  be  performed for each line can also be taken
187              from a macro defined earlier by giving the name of the macro  as
188              the argument to thru.
189
190       reset
191       reset variable1[,] variable2 ...
192              Reset  pre-defined  variables  variable1, variable2 ... to their
193              default values.  If no  arguments  are  given,  reset  all  pre-
194              defined  variables to their default values.  Note that assigning
195              a value to scale also causes all pre-defined variables that con‐
196              trol  dimensions  to  be reset to their default values times the
197              new value of scale.
198
199       plot expr ["text"]
200              This is a text object which is constructed by using  text  as  a
201              format  string for sprintf with an argument of expr.  If text is
202              omitted a format string of "%g"  is  used.   Attributes  can  be
203              specified  in the same way as for a normal text object.  Be very
204              careful that you specify an appropriate format string; pic  does
205              only very limited checking of the string.  This is deprecated in
206              favour of sprintf.
207
208       variable := expr
209              This is similar to = except variable must  already  be  defined,
210              and  expr  will be assigned to variable without creating a vari‐
211              able local to the current block.  (By contrast,  =  defines  the
212              variable  in  the  current  block  if  it is not already defined
213              there, and then changes the value in the  current  block  only.)
214              For example, the following:
215
216                     .PS
217                     x = 3
218                     y = 3
219                     [
220                       x := 5
221                       y = 5
222                     ]
223                     print x " " y
224                     .PE
225
226              prints
227
228                     5 3
229
230       Arguments of the form
231
232              X anything X
233
234       are also allowed to be of the form
235
236              { anything }
237
238       In  this  case  anything  can  contain balanced occurrences of { and }.
239       Strings may contain X or imbalanced occurrences of { and }.
240
241   Expressions
242       The syntax for expressions has been significantly extended:
243
244       x ^ y (exponentiation)
245       sin(x)
246       cos(x)
247       atan2(y, x)
248       log(x) (base 10)
249       exp(x) (base 10, i.e. 10^x)
250       sqrt(x)
251       int(x)
252       rand() (return a random number between 0 and 1)
253       rand(x) (return a random number between 1 and x; deprecated)
254       srand(x) (set the random number seed)
255       max(e1, e2)
256       min(e1, e2)
257       !e
258       e1 && e2
259       e1 || e2
260       e1 == e2
261       e1 != e2
262       e1 >= e2
263       e1 > e2
264       e1 <= e2
265       e1 < e2
266       "str1" == "str2"
267       "str1" != "str2"
268
269       String comparison expressions must be parenthesised in some contexts to
270       avoid ambiguity.
271
272   Other Changes
273       A  bare  expression, expr, is acceptable as an attribute; it is equiva‐
274       lent to dir expr, where dir is the current direction.  For example
275
276              line 2i
277
278       means draw a line 2 inches long in the current direction.  The ‘i’  (or
279       ‘I’)  character  is  ignored;  to use another measurement unit, set the
280       scale variable to an appropriate value.
281
282       The maximum width and height of the picture are taken  from  the  vari‐
283       ables maxpswid and maxpsht.  Initially these have values 8.5 and 11.
284
285       Scientific notation is allowed for numbers.  For example
286
287              x = 5e-2
288
289       Text attributes can be compounded.  For example,
290
291              "foo" above ljust
292
293       is valid.
294
295       There  is  no  limit to the depth to which blocks can be examined.  For
296       example,
297
298              [A: [B: [C: box ]]] with .A.B.C.sw at 1,2
299              circle at last [].A.B.C
300
301       is acceptable.
302
303       Arcs now have compass points determined by the circle of which the  arc
304       is a part.
305
306       Circles,  ellipses,  and  arcs  can  be  dotted or dashed.  In TeX mode
307       splines can be dotted or dashed also.
308
309       Boxes can have rounded corners.  The rad attribute specifies the radius
310       of  the quarter-circles at each corner.  If no rad or diam attribute is
311       given, a radius of boxrad is used.  Initially, boxrad has a value of 0.
312       A box with rounded corners can be dotted or dashed.
313
314       Boxes  can have slanted sides.  This effectively changes the shape of a
315       box from a rectangle to an arbitrary parallelogram.  The  xslanted  and
316       yslanted attributes specify the x and y offset of the box's upper right
317       corner from its default position.
318
319       The .PS line can have a second argument specifying a maximum height for
320       the  picture.   If  the  width  of  zero is specified the width will be
321       ignored in computing the scaling factor for the picture.  Note that GNU
322       pic  will  always scale a picture by the same amount vertically as well
323       as horizontally.  This is different from the  DWB  2.0  pic  which  may
324       scale a picture by a different amount vertically than horizontally if a
325       height is specified.
326
327       Each text object has an invisible box associated with it.  The  compass
328       points  of  a  text  object  are  determined by this box.  The implicit
329       motion associated with the object is also determined by this box.   The
330       dimensions  of this box are taken from the width and height attributes;
331       if the width attribute is not supplied then the width will be taken  to
332       be  textwid;  if  the  height attribute is not supplied then the height
333       will be taken to be the number of  text  strings  associated  with  the
334       object times textht.  Initially textwid and textht have a value of 0.
335
336       In  (almost  all)  places  where  a  quoted text string can be used, an
337       expression of the form
338
339              sprintf("format", arg,...)
340
341       can also be used; this will produce the arguments  formatted  according
342       to format, which should be a string as described in printf(3) appropri‐
343       ate for the number of arguments supplied.
344
345       The thickness of the lines used to draw objects is  controlled  by  the
346       linethick  variable.   This  gives the thickness of lines in points.  A
347       negative value means use the default thickness:  in  TeX  output  mode,
348       this  means  use  a thickness of 8 milliinches; in TeX output mode with
349       the -c option, this means use  the  line  thickness  specified  by  .ps
350       lines; in troff output mode, this means use a thickness proportional to
351       the pointsize.  A zero value means draw the thinnest possible line sup‐
352       ported by the output device.  Initially it has a value of -1.  There is
353       also a thick[ness] attribute.  For example,
354
355              circle thickness 1.5
356
357       would draw a circle using a line with a thickness of 1.5  points.   The
358       thickness  of lines is not affected by the value of the scale variable,
359       nor by the width or height given in the .PS line.
360
361       Boxes (including boxes with rounded corners or slanted sides),  circles
362       and  ellipses  can  be  filled by giving them an attribute of fill[ed].
363       This takes an optional argument of an expression with a value between 0
364       and  1; 0 will fill it with white, 1 with black, values in between with
365       a proportionally gray shade.  A value greater than 1 can also be  used:
366       this means fill with the shade of gray that is currently being used for
367       text and lines.  Normally this will be black, but  output  devices  may
368       provide  a  mechanism for changing this.  Without an argument, then the
369       value of the variable fillval will be used.  Initially this has a value
370       of  0.5.   The  invisible  attribute  does  not  affect  the filling of
371       objects.  Any text associated with a filled object will be added  after
372       the  object  has  been filled, so that the text will not be obscured by
373       the filling.
374
375       Three additional modifiers are available to  specify  colored  objects:
376       outline[d]  sets  the  color of the outline, shaded the fill color, and
377       colo[u]r[ed] sets both.  All three keywords expect a suffix  specifying
378       the color, for example
379
380              circle shaded "green" outline "black"
381
382       Currently, color support isn't available in TeX mode.  Predefined color
383       names for groff are in the device macro  files,  for  example  ps.tmac;
384       additional  colors  can  be defined with the .defcolor request (see the
385       manual page of troff(1) for more details).
386
387       To change the name of the vbox in TeX  mode,  set  the  pseudo-variable
388       figname  (which  is  actually a specially parsed command) within a pic‐
389       ture.  Example:
390
391              .PS
392              figname = foobar;
393              ...
394              .PE
395
396       The picture is then available in the box \foobar.
397
398       pic assumes that at the beginning of a  picture  both  glyph  and  fill
399       color are set to the default value.
400
401       Arrow  heads will be drawn as solid triangles if the variable arrowhead
402       is non-zero and either TeX mode is enabled or the  -n  option  has  not
403       been  given.   Initially  arrowhead  has a value of 1.  Note that solid
404       arrow heads are always filled with the current outline color.
405
406       The troff output of pic is device-independent.  The -T option is there‐
407       fore  redundant.   All  numbers  are taken to be in inches; numbers are
408       never interpreted to be in troff machine units.
409
410       Objects can have an aligned attribute.  This  will  only  work  if  the
411       postprocessor  is grops, or gropdf.  Any text associated with an object
412       having the aligned attribute will be rotated about the  center  of  the
413       object  so  that it is aligned in the direction from the start point to
414       the end point of the object.  Note that this  attribute  will  have  no
415       effect for objects whose start and end points are coincident.
416
417       In places where nth is allowed expr’th is also allowed.  Note that ’th
418       is a single token: no space is allowed between the and the  th.   For
419       example,
420
421              for i = 1 to 4 do {
422                 line from ‘i’th box.nw to ‘i+1’th box.se
423              }
424

CONVERSION

426       To  obtain a stand-alone picture from a pic file, enclose your pic code
427       with .PS and .PE requests; roff configuration commands may be added  at
428       the beginning of the file, but no roff text.
429
430       It  is  necessary  to feed this file into groff without adding any page
431       information, so you must check which .PS and .PE requests are  actually
432       called.  For example, the mm macro package adds a page number, which is
433       very annoying.  At the moment, calling standard groff without any macro
434       package  works.   Alternatively, you can define your own requests, e.g.
435       to do nothing:
436
437              .de PS
438              ..
439              .de PE
440              ..
441
442       groff itself does not provide direct  conversion  into  other  graphics
443       file  formats.  But there are lots of possibilities if you first trans‐
444       form your picture into PostScript® format using the groff option  -Tps.
445       Since  this ps-file lacks BoundingBox information it is not very useful
446       by itself, but it may be fed into other  conversion  programs,  usually
447       named  ps2other  or  pstoother  or  the like.  Moreover, the PostScript
448       interpreter ghostscript (gs) has built-in graphics  conversion  devices
449       that are called with the option
450
451              gs -sDEVICE=<devname>
452
453       Call
454
455              gs --help
456
457       for a list of the available devices.
458
459       An  alternative  may be to use the -Tpdf option to convert your picture
460       directly into PDF format.  The MediaBox of the  file  produced  can  be
461       controlled by passing a -P-p papersize to groff.
462
463       As the Encapsulated PostScript File Format EPS is getting more and more
464       important, and the conversion wasn't regarded trivial in the  past  you
465       might  be  interested  to  know  that  there is a conversion tool named
466       ps2eps which does the right job.  It  is  much  better  than  the  tool
467       ps2epsi packaged with gs.
468
469       For  bitmapped  graphic  formats, you should use pstopnm; the resulting
470       (intermediate) PNM file can be then converted to virtually any graphics
471       format using the tools of the netpbm package .
472

FILES

474       /usr/share/groff/1.22.3/tmac/pic.tmac
475              Example definitions of the PS and PE macros.
476

SEE ALSO

478       troff(1),   groff_out(5),   tex(1),   gs(1),   ps2eps(1),   pstopnm(1),
479       ps2epsi(1), pnm(5)
480
481       Eric S. Raymond, Making Pictures With GNU PIC.
482       /usr/share/doc/groff/pic.ps (this file, together with its source  file,
483       pic.ms, is part of the groff documentation)
484
485       Tpic: Pic for TeX
486
487       Brian  W.  Kernighan,  PIC   A Graphics Language for Typesetting (User
488       Manual).  AT&T Bell Laboratories, Computing  Science  Technical  Report
489       No. 116
490       <http://cm.bell-labs.com/cm/cs/cstr/116.ps.gz> (revised May, 1991).
491
492       ps2eps is available from CTAN mirrors, e.g.
493       <ftp://ftp.dante.de/tex-archive/support/ps2eps/>
494
495       W. Richard Stevens, Turning PIC Into HTML
496       <http://www.kohala.com/start/troff/pic2html.html>
497
498       W. Richard Stevens, Examples of picMacros
499       <http://www.kohala.com/start/troff/pic.examples.ps>
500

BUGS

502       Input  characters  that  are  invalid for groff (i.e., those with ASCII
503       code 0, or 013 octal, or between 015 and 037 octal, or between 0200 and
504       0237 octal) are rejected even in TeX mode.
505
506       The interpretation of fillval is incompatible with the pic in 10th edi‐
507       tion Unix, which interprets 0 as black and 1 as white.
508
509       PostScript® is a registered trademark of Adobe Systems Incorporation.
510

COPYING

512       Copyright © 1989-2014 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
513
514       Permission is granted to make and distribute verbatim  copies  of  this
515       manual  provided  the  copyright  notice and this permission notice are
516       preserved on all copies.
517
518       Permission is granted to copy and distribute modified versions of  this
519       manual  under  the  conditions  for verbatim copying, provided that the
520       entire resulting derived work is distributed under the terms of a  per‐
521       mission notice identical to this one.
522
523       Permission  is granted to copy and distribute translations of this man‐
524       ual into another language, under the above conditions for modified ver‐
525       sions,  except  that this permission notice may be included in transla‐
526       tions approved by the Free Software Foundation instead of in the origi‐
527       nal English.
528
529
530
531Groff Version 1.22.3            4 November 2014                         PIC(1)
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