Some notes on using Groff to produce a Table of Contents with the ms macros

toc_for_ms.org

Table Of Contents

Example of automatic creating of tables of contents in groff

.NH
method

.XS \" index start
method contents
.XE \" end index
.LP
this is the method maragraph
.bp
.NH 2
pethod
.XS
pethod
.XE
.LP
phis is the method maragraph
.TC \" create table of contents

Example of manual creating of tables of contents in groff

.XS 1 \" toc start with index at page 1
method contents
.XA 2 \" index at page 2
pethod
.XE \" end toc listing
.LP
.NH
method
.bp
.NH 2
pethod
.LP
phis is the method maragraph

.TC \" create table of contents on seperate page

No Auto Relocating TOC

groff -Tpdf -ms "$file" > "$base".pdf

pdfroff -Tpdf -ms "$file" > "$base".pdf

Using mspdf to Generate TOC

Automatic TOC Using mspdf

.NH
.XN "method"
.LP
hello
.NH 2
.XN "pethod"
.LP
phis is the method maragraph
.TC \" create table of contents

No Auto Relocating TOC

groff -Tpdf -mspdf "$file" > "$base".pdf

No Auto Relocating TOC alternative

groff -Tps -mspdf "$file" | ps2pdf - > "$base".pdf

Auto Relocating TOC alternative using pdfroff

pdfroff -mspdf "$file" > "$base".pdf

Personally I use groff for quick things like notes and simple markup but use neatroff for anything I need complex formatting like this since neatroff is substantially nicer to hack on in my experience. Since I use org more these days I don't use groff it's self all that often.