Bonner Lab Runoff is a text formatter which when used with your favorite
editor makes a complete word processor. Its syntax is almost a complete
emulation of DSR (Digital Standard Runoff) and it is very compatible with
previous versions of Runoff. The intent of this program is to support
complete scientific word processing to produce publication quality
output. It has been used to produce thesis, progress reports, and
scientific papers here at Rice University.
This version allows complete control of any special printer available via
user definable escape sequences. In addition a macro facility allows
text or sequences of commands to be abbreviated to a single label. If
the printer has the correct features then variable spacing,subscripting,
superscripting, and equation formatting are possible. By properly defin-
ing escape sequences the user may support different printers in a
transparent fashion. In other words the same input text will print in
identical fashion on different printers with different control codes and
escape sequences.
Table of contents, indexing and sub-indexing are all supported. Multiple
table of contents or multiple indexing may be constructed from the avail-
able commands. A variety of LAYOUT and STYLE commands may completely
change the look of the pages. Table layout is simplified by right
justified and 'decimal' justified tabs. Permanent margins which apply to
the page headers are available. These simplify the setting of header and
text margins.
This runs under VMS, RSX, IAS, RT11, TSX, and probably RSTS. RNO oc-
cupies a minimum of 31 to 37 kbytes depending on the operating system.
BONNER LAB RUNOFF Page 2
Distribution
DISTRIBUTION
This distribution of BONNER LAB RUNOFF contains all the .MAC, .RNO, .TST,
.CMD, .COM and .DOC files necessary to build and test RNO. BUILD.DOC or
RUNOFF.DOC give the necessary preceedures to build RNO. The distributed
RUNOFF.DOC file refers to the VMS version, but in the process of building
RNO you may generate documentation suitable for the target operating
system. The following are enhancements since the Fall '83 version.
ENHANCEMENTS
1. .TEXT DEFERRED allows a block of text to be declared for
output on the next available page. This is intended for defin-
ing captioned figures.
2. .ENABLE/DISABLE NUMBERING commands allow page numbering to
be suspended. These are not affected by the .NUMBER PAGE com-
mand.
3. .ENABLE/DISABLE NUMBERING CHAPTER allow chapter-page number-
ing to be suspended without having it reenabled by .NUMBER
CHAPTER.
4. .ENABLE ODD forces the first page of each chapter onto an
odd page by skipping pages if necessary. .PAGE ODD,.PAGE EVEN
force page numbers to be odd or even by skipping pages if neces-
sary.
5. /EV,/OD switches allow selection of odd or even page output.
6. Limits have been set on parameters so that the maximum page
size is 127 lines by 255 spaces. This limitation has been in
previous versions even though not explicitly stated. Now at-
tempts to exceed these limits will cause error messages rather
than mysterious errors.
7. .TAB STOPS may now be specified as a relative value +n from
the previous one. The first tab stop may be specifed relative
to the current left margin. This is not compatible with DSR
usage, but is much more useful than DSR usage.
8. .TAB PROPORTIONAL command allows tab stops to be evenly
proportioned across a page.
9. Commands not available in DSR have been marked in the docu-
mentation. In addition parameters which differ from DSR are
also noted.
10. RT-11 support has been added to this version.
11. .ELSE has been added the same as in DSR.
12. .LAYOUT has been extended to 15 values from 7.
13. .RIGHT TEXT and .END RIGHT commands added.
14. .TYPE command has been added to allow messages to be typed
on the terminal.
15. .HEADERS has been made the standard command and .HEADER is
now the nonstandard alternate.
16. .REQUIRE "TI:" may now be used to get input from the termi-
nal. Previously .REQUIRE "TI:filename" was necessary for input.
17. Multiple input files are allowed on the RNO command line.
The first input filename is the default output filename.
BONNER LAB RUNOFF Page 3
Enhancements
18. .NO VARIANT turns off a variant.
19. .FLAGS TAB and .NO FLAGS TAB have been added to allow
redefinition of the tab flag.
20. .PAGING/.NO PAGING commands have been added. These are
useful in generating help files.
21. Both .AUTOHYPHENATION and .PERIOD commands have been ex-
tended to allow user selectable punctuation rules.
22. .DEFINE COMMAND has been extended to allow multiple word
labels.
23. .DELETE COMMAND/SUBSTITUTE have been added to allow remov-
ing a single entry.
24. Literal input has been modified to allow imbedded quotes or
apostrophes.
25. The .DISPLAY commands have been enhanced to allow automatic
underlining, bolding or use of any special feature of your
printer. The pre and post-fixes may contain any flags except
for equations and tabs.
26. .DISPLAY LEVELS now supports level numbers with separate
pre and post-fixes for each level. This allows possible
autotmatic underlining, bolding etc. of header levels.
27. .DISPLAY TITLE/SUBTITLE make automatic underlining/bolding
of page titles and subtitles feasable.
28. .SAVE and .RESTORE commands allow the user to quickly
change the current status, and set up automatic status.
29. .STYLE HEADERS has been extended to allow for section
header numbers in the form of lists (a or b or c instead of
a.b.c)
30. The new style and display features are illustrated in DIS-
PLA.tst which works on a VT-100 terminal and DISLEV.tst.
31. The command syntax has been further loosened to allow a
large variety of command abbreviations in addition to the
standard ones.
32. A parameter has been added to the .PRINT INDEX "entry" to
allow printing only a specific entry (subindex). .DELETE INDEX
"entry" allows deleting an index entry, and .RESET INDEX clears
the entire index buffer.
33. .SEND PAGE TOC allows text to be inserted into the table of
contents with a page number. The text may be braketed by .IF
commands.
34. .ENABLE/DISABLE UNCONDITIONAL allow turning off uncondi-
tional lines of input. This may be used with .SEND PAGE TOC to
produce separate table of contents for figures, tables etc.
35. The .TOC command was changed to produce better table of
contents output by using the paragraph test text parameter.
36. A parameter has been added to .PARAGRAPH, .TEST PAGE, .TEST
TEXT which prevents orphan lines on the next page. This also
applies to lists, and notes.
37. Dynamic memory is reclaimed more efficiently, to prevent
memory overflow.
38. .DO INDEX was changed to conform to DSR usage.
BONNER LAB RUNOFF Page 4
Enhancements
NOTE
If you find any bugs I would appreciate getting a copy of both
the .RNO and .DOC files containing these bugs. If you could
isolate the bug and demonstrate it in just a few lines of input
I would appreciate the effort. I will try to fix bad bugs or
at least create a workaround. I do not guarantee anything.
John Clement
Bonner Nuclear Lab
Rice University
Box 1892
Houston Tx, 77251
(713) 527-4018