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7.14.2 library man pages

Man pages for libraries are documented using the ‘agman3.tpl’ template.

Two global definitions are required, and then one library man page is produced for each export_func definition that is found. It is generally convenient to place these definitions as ‘getdefs’ comments (see section Invoking getdefs) near the procedure definition, but they may also be a separate AutoGen definitions file (see section Definitions File). Each function will be cross referenced with their sister functions in a ‘SEE ALSO’ section. A global see_also definition will be appended to this cross referencing text.

The two global definitions required are:

libraryThis is the name of your library, without the ‘lib’ prefix. The AutoOpts library is named ‘libopts.so...’, so the library attribute would have the value opts.
headerGenerally, using a library with a compiled program entails #include-ing a header file. Name that header with this attribute. In the case of AutoOpts, it is generated and will vary based on the name of the option definition file. Consequently, ‘your-opts.h’ is specified.

The export_func definition should contain the following attributes:

nameThe name of the procedure the library user may call.
whatA brief sentence describing what the procedure does.
docA detailed description of what the procedure does. It may ramble on for as long as necessary to properly describe it.
errA short description of how errors are handled.
ret_typeThe data type returned by the procedure. Omit this for void procedures.
ret_descDescribe what the returned value is, if needed.
privateIf specified, the function will not be documented. This is used, for example, to produce external declarations for functions that are not available for public use, but are used in the generated text.
argThis is a compound attribute that contains:
arg_typeThe data type of the argument.
arg_nameA short name for it.
arg_descA brief description.

As a ‘getdefs’ comment, this would appear something like this:

 
/*=--subblock=arg=arg_type,arg_name,arg_desc =*/
/*=*
 * library: opts
 * header:  your-opts.h
=*/
/*=export_func optionProcess
 *
 * what: this is the main option processing routine
 * arg:  + tOptions* + pOpts + program options descriptor +
 * arg:  + int       + argc  + program arg count  +
 * arg:  + char**    + argv  + program arg vector +
 * ret_type:  int
 * ret_desc:  the count of the arguments processed
 *
 * doc:  This is what it does.
 * err:  When it can't, it does this.
=*/

Note the subblock and library comments. subblock is an embedded ‘getdefs’ option (see getdefs subblock) that tells it how to parse the arg attribute. The library and header entries are global definitions that apply to all the documented functions.


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This document was generated by Bruce Korb on August 21, 2015 using texi2html 1.82.