Subject: DOCS QUESTION - space added within synopsis replaceable tag.

From: Peter Smith <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 19 Feb 2026 10:33:58 +1100

Hi,

Looking at the Server Applications page synopses:

AFAICT whenever there is a preceeding <group> in the SGML, then the
next <replaceable> part renders jammed against that group.

It seems like historically some people did not like that result, so
have added a space in the <replaceable> to make the rendered synopsis
look (they judged) a bit more readable.

But this "fix" is quite ad-hoc: Only a couple of pages do it, other
pages do not.

e.g
initdb - space added in <replaceable> datadir</replaceable>
pg_rewind - space in <replaceable> datadir</replaceable>

versus

pg_checksums - no space before datadir
pg_controldata - no space before datadir
pg_createsubscriber - no space before any of dbname,datadir,connstr
pg_resetwal - no space before datadir

~~~

The only examples I can find that do this are in initdb.sgml and pg_rewind.sgml.

What do others think about it, and what is the next step?

0. Do nothing. It's harmless. Leave as-is.
1. Remove the space hacks, and just let the SGML rendering do whatever it wants.
2. Add more space hacks to other places so they render the same.

TBH, I prefer option 0.

Thanks.

======
[1] initdb - https://www.postgresql.org/docs/devel/app-initdb.html
[2] pg_checksums - https://www.postgresql.org/docs/devel/app-pgchecksums.html

Kind Regards.
Peter Smith.
Fujitsu Australia.