Placing a PIC image in an arbitrary position of the page using ms macros

Question

I have an image defined using PIC and incorporated to a groff ms document.

I notice that I need to encapsulate the image inside a .DS L - .DE block to have it aligned to left. Otherwise is centered.

What shall be done to have the image in a file and be able to position the image anywhere in the page? (specifying coordinates).

This is what I have tried:

\h'2in'\v'4in'FOOTEXT\v'-4in'

But the problem is if you replace FOOTEXT with a .PS .PE image the image will be centered, and if you use .DS L .DE it does not work, the paragraph is displayed in its normal ms position.

While groff is not a mainstream tool anymore, I was wondering if someone using it could provide some help to achieve this.

Answer 1

It is one of the limitations of pic. If you need to be more flexible, you can create an encapsulated postscript file of the PIC image:

pic blk.pic > blk.groff
groff blk.groff > blk.ps
eps2eps -B1  blk.ps blk.eps

and include that. This makes it even possible to use the PIC images in-line:

.P
An in-line picture is also possible, and it is not limited to
\v'0.12v'
.dospark block/blk.eps 21.4 12
\v'-0.12v'
pic images.
.P

Note: dospark is a macro by Ted Harding.