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<h3 class="section" id="gtroff-Output-1">6.1 <code class="code">gtroff</code> Output</h3>
<a class="index-entry-id" id="index-gtroff_002c-output"></a>
<a class="index-entry-id" id="index-output_002c-gtroff"></a>
<p>This section describes the <code class="code">groff</code> intermediate output format
produced by GNU <code class="code">troff</code>.
</p>
<p>As <code class="code">groff</code> is a wrapper program around GNU <code class="code">troff</code> and
automatically calls an output driver (or “postprocessor”), this output
does not show up normally. This is why it is called
<em class="emph">intermediate</em>. <code class="code">groff</code> provides the option <samp class="option">-Z</samp> to
inhibit postprocessing such that the produced intermediate output is
sent to standard output just as it is when calling GNU <code class="code">troff</code>
directly.
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<a class="index-entry-id" id="index-troff-output"></a>
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<a class="index-entry-id" id="index-intermediate-output"></a>
<a class="index-entry-id" id="index-output_002c-intermediate"></a>
<p>Here, the term <em class="dfn">troff output</em> describes what is output by
GNU <code class="code">troff</code>, while <em class="dfn">intermediate output</em> refers to the language
that is accepted by the parser that prepares this output for the output
drivers. This parser handles whitespace more flexibly than
<abbr class="acronym">AT&T</abbr>’s implementation and implements obsolete elements for
compatibility; otherwise, both formats are the same.<a class="footnote" id="DOCF124" href="groff.html_fot.html#FOOT124"><sup>124</sup></a>
</p>
<p>The main purpose of the intermediate output concept is to facilitate the
development of postprocessors by providing a common programming
interface for all devices. It has a language of its own that is
completely different from the <code class="code">gtroff</code> language. While the
<code class="code">gtroff</code> language is a high-level programming language for text
processing, the intermediate output language is a kind of low-level
assembler language by specifying all positions on the page for writing
and drawing.
</p>
<p>The intermediate output produced by <code class="code">gtroff</code> is fairly readable,
while output from <abbr class="acronym">AT&T</abbr> <code class="code">troff</code> is rather hard to
understand because of strange habits that are still supported, but not
used any longer by <code class="code">gtroff</code>.
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