std::async Synopsis formatting is messed up

[k4rtik]

Formatting of synopsis section of man std::async is messed up to the point of being undecipherable, no matter what terminal window height I try.

It most certainly has to do with the complex table format in use at http://en.cppreference.com/w/cpp/thread/async

[theidexisted]

The mess format isn't caused by stdman itself, I have checked the output man page, the content seems normal.

The man command has a configuration MANWIDTH which controls the behavior, you can try something like:

MANWIDTH=99 man std::async and see the difference, which looks better, but not perfect.

.TH std::async 3 "2020.11.17" "http://cppreference.com" "C++ Standard Libary"
.SH NAME
std::async \- std::async

.SH Synopsis
Defined in header <future>
template< class Function, class... Args>                                             (since
                                                                                     C++11)
std::future<std::result_of_t<std::decay_t<Function>(std::decay_t<Args>...)>>         (until
                                                                                     C++17)
    async( Function&& f, Args&&... args );
template< class Function, class... Args>
                                                                                     (since
std::future<std::invoke_result_t<std::decay_t<Function>,                             C++17)
                                              std::decay_t<Args>...>>                (until
                                                                                     C++20)
    async( Function&& f, Args&&... args );
template< class Function, class... Args>

[[nodiscard]]                                                                        (since
std::future<std::invoke_result_t<std::decay_t<Function>,                             C++20)
                                 std::decay_t<Args>...>>

    async( Function&& f, Args&&... args );                                   \fB(1)\fP
template< class Function, class... Args >                                                   (since
                                                                                            C++11)
std::future<std::result_of_t<std::decay_t<Function>(std::decay_t<Args>...)>>                (until
                                                                                            C++17)
    async( std::launch policy, Function&& f, Args&&... args );
template< class Function, class... Args >
                                                                                            (since
std::future<std::invoke_result_t<std::decay_t<Function>,                                    C++17)
                                 std::decay_t<Args>...>>                         \fB(2)\fP        (until
                                                                                            C++20)
    async( std::launch policy, Function&& f, Args&&... args );
template< class Function, class... Args >

[[nodiscard]]                                                                               (since
std::future<std::invoke_result_t<std::decay_t<Function>,                                    C++20)
                                 std::decay_t<Args>...>>

    async( std::launch policy, Function&& f, Args&&... args );

   The template function async runs the function f asynchronously (potentially in a
   separate thread which may be part of a thread pool) and returns a std::future that
   will eventually hold the result of that function call.

   1) Behaves as if \fB(2)\fP is called with policy being std::launch::async |
   std::launch::deferred. In other words, f may be executed in another thread or it may
   be run synchronously when the resulting std::future is queried for a value.
   2) Calls a function f with arguments args according to a specific launch policy
   policy:

     * If the async flag is set (i.e. (policy & std::launch::async) != 0), then async
       executes the callable object f on a new thread of execution (with all
       thread-locals initialized) as if spawned by std::thread(std::forward<F>(f),
       std::forward<Args>(args)...), except that if the function f returns a value or
       throws an exception, it is stored in the shared state accessible through the
       std::future that async returns to the caller.
     * If the deferred flag is set (i.e. (policy & std::launch::deferred) != 0), then
       async converts f and args... the same way as by std::thread constructor, but
       does not spawn a new thread of execution. Instead, lazy evaluation is performed:
       the first call to a non-timed wait function on the std::future that async
       returned to the caller will cause the copy of f to be invoked (as an rvalue)
       with the copies of args... (also passed as rvalues) in the current thread (which
       does not have to be the thread that originally called std::async). The result or
       exception is placed in the shared state associated with the future and only then
       it is made ready. All further accesses to the same std::future will return the
       result immediately.
     * If both the std::launch::async and std::launch::deferred flags are set in
       policy, it is up to the implementation whether to perform asynchronous execution
       or lazy evaluation.

     * If neither std::launch::async nor std::launch::deferred, nor any
       implementation-defined policy flag is set in policy, the behavior  \fI(since C++14)\fP
       is undefined.

   In any case, the call to std::async synchronizes-with (as defined in
   std::memory_order) the call to f, and the completion of f is sequenced-before making
   the shared state ready. If the async policy is chosen, the associated thread
   completion synchronizes-with the successful return from the first function that is
   waiting on the shared state, or with the return of the last function that releases
   the shared state, whichever comes first.

.SH Parameters

   f       - Callable object to call
   args... - parameters to pass to f
             bitmask value, where individual bits control the allowed methods of
             execution
   policy  -
             Bit                   Explanation
             std::launch::async    enable asynchronous evaluation
             std::launch::deferred enable lazy evaluation
.SH Type requirements
   -
   Function, Args must meet the requirements of MoveConstructible.

.SH Return value

   std::future referring to the shared state created by this call to std::async.

.SH Exceptions

   Throws std::system_error with error condition
   std::errc::resource_unavailable_try_again if the launch policy equals
   std::launch::async and the implementation is unable to start a new thread (if the
   policy is async|deferred or has additional bits set, it will fall back to deferred
   or the implementation-defined policies in this case), or std::bad_alloc if memory
   for the internal data structures could not be allocated.

.SH Notes

   The implementation may extend the behavior of the first overload of std::async by
   enabling additional (implementation-defined) bits in the default launch policy.

   Examples of implementation-defined launch policies are the sync policy (execute
   immediately, within the async call) and the task policy (similar to async, but
   thread-locals are not cleared)

   If the std::future obtained from std::async is not moved from or bound to a
   reference, the destructor of the std::future will block at the end of the full
   expression until the asynchronous operation completes, essentially making code such
   as the following synchronous:

 std::async(std::launch::async, []{ f(); }); // temporary's dtor waits for f()
 std::async(std::launch::async, []{ g(); }); // does not start until f() completes

   (note that the destructors of std::futures obtained by means other than a call to
   std::async never block)

   Defect reports

   The following behavior-changing defect reports were applied retroactively to
   previously published C++ standards.

      DR    Applied to         Behavior as published              Correct behavior
                       return type incorrect and value       corrected return type and
   LWG 2021 C++11      category of arguments unclear in the  clarified that rvalues are
                       deferred case                         used

.SH Example

   
// Run this code

 #include <iostream>
 #include <vector>
 #include <algorithm>
 #include <numeric>
 #include <future>
 #include <string>
 #include <mutex>
  
 std::mutex m;
 struct X {
     void foo(int i, const std::string& str) {
         std::lock_guard<std::mutex> lk(m);
         std::cout << str << ' ' << i << '\\n';
     }
     void bar(const std::string& str) {
         std::lock_guard<std::mutex> lk(m);
         std::cout << str << '\\n';
     }
     int operator()(int i) {
         std::lock_guard<std::mutex> lk(m);
         std::cout << i << '\\n';
         return i + 10;
     }
 };
  
 template <typename RandomIt>
 int parallel_sum(RandomIt beg, RandomIt end)
 {
     auto len = end - beg;
     if (len < 1000)
         return std::accumulate(beg, end, 0);
  
     RandomIt mid = beg + len/2;
     auto handle = std::async(std::launch::async,
                              parallel_sum<RandomIt>, mid, end);
     int sum = parallel_sum(beg, mid);
     return sum + handle.get();
 }
  
 int main()
 {
     std::vector<int> v(10000, 1);
     std::cout << "The sum is " << parallel_sum(v.begin(), v.end()) << '\\n';
  
     X x;
     // Calls (&x)->foo(42, "Hello") with default policy:
     // may print "Hello 42" concurrently or defer execution
     auto a1 = std::async(&X::foo, &x, 42, "Hello");
     // Calls x.bar("world!") with deferred policy
     // prints "world!" when a2.get() or a2.wait() is called
     auto a2 = std::async(std::launch::deferred, &X::bar, x, "world!");
     // Calls X()(43); with async policy
     // prints "43" concurrently
     auto a3 = std::async(std::launch::async, X(), 43);
     a2.wait();                     // prints "world!"
     std::cout << a3.get() << '\\n'; // prints "53"
 } // if a1 is not done at this point, destructor of a1 prints "Hello 42" here

.SH Possible output:

 The sum is 10000
 43
 world!
 53
 Hello 42