Hello,
I should have released these patches a few time ago, but Alioth had troubles.
Sorry if this mail is a little bit long.
Some are still not "ready for production", and are provided to inform you
I'm working on those subjects (and also to grab some ideas).
I also had to work on the testsuite (the check script) and added a
stats.sh scripts for regression tests. Here are how this last script
formats regression tests statistics:
$ ./stats.sh orig work
        IGN    OK   OK2  WOK1  WOK2  WOK3   PBS WDIFF
  IGN  1698     0     0     0     0     0     0     0
   OK     0   125     0     0     0     0     0     0
  OK2     0     0  1564     4     2     0     0     0
 WOK1     0     8     0    89     0     1     0     0
 WOK2     0     0     0     0   208     0     0     1
 WOK3     0     2    11     2     4   301     3     0
  PBS     0    35   150    15    48    43   585    14
WDIFF     0     1     9     4     5     8     0    39
total:  4979 | 4979
(It takes two directories in argument, the two directories containing
results of the check script, i.e. the LISTE files. It creates a stats_work
directory.)
You can read this table like this:
11 man pages which were in the WOK3 category in orig are now in OK2.
Those pages can be found in stats_work/WOK3_OK2
The different categories are:
  IGN   man pages po4a refused to operate on (e.g. wad generated by
        Pod::Man)
  OK    diff -uBb didn't see any difference
        This can contain very rare misformatting
  OK2   diff -uBb didn't see any difference after converting hyphens to
        minus sign, `` to ", and '' to " in both man pages
        This contains a little bit more misformatting, for example an man
        page referring to an empty argument ('') should not display only ".
  WOK1  wdiff doesn't see any difference after the same modifications
  WOK2  This tries to detect changes in the hyphenation of words (but has
        more false negative)
  WOK3  This removes minus signs, and thus detects more changes in
        hyphenation
  PBS   po4a preferred to stop processing the man page (non supported
        macro, ...)
  WDIFF These are probably bugs in po4a or in the man page (I started
        reporting some of them in the BTS, which is another way of
        improving po4a statistics)
       
In the table above, it is usually an improvement to have big numbers on
the bottom left corner (with the exception of the IGN column).
Here are the patches for the Man module:
  + comments
    It recognize some (probably incorrect, but usual) comment lines.
    Here are the results of the regression tests for this patch:
        IGN    OK   OK2  WOK1  WOK2  WOK3   PBS WDIFF
  IGN  1698     0     0     0     0     0     0     0
   OK     0   125     0     0     0     0     0     0
  OK2     0     0  1570     0     0     0     0     0
 WOK1     0     0     0    98     0     0     0     0
 WOK2     0     0     0     0   209     0     0     0
 WOK3     0     0     0     0     0   323     0     0
  PBS     0     0     3     0     1     1   885     0
WDIFF     0     0     1     1     0     1     0    63
  + nested_fonts
    It deals with the nested font issue.
    I have an idea on how to simplify it a lot, but I think it could be
    applied, because it is doing a good job.
    The only remaining issue is with "un-terminated" fonts, as in:
      Hello, my name is \fINicolas \fBFRANÇOIS
    IMHO, in groff, there is no nested font (with some exceptions, like
    SB, and some italic and bold faces, or by using exotic tmac).
    \fIfoo\fBbar\fR is equivalent to \fIfoo\fR\fBbar\fR (with the
    exception of the \fP).
    Here are the results of the regression tests for this patch:
        IGN    OK   OK2  WOK1  WOK2  WOK3   PBS WDIFF
  IGN  1698     0     0     0     0     0     0     0
   OK     0   125     0     0     0     0     0     0
  OK2     0     0  1562     0     0     0     8     0
 WOK1     0     0     0    98     0     0     0     0
 WOK2     0     0     0     0   209     0     0     0
 WOK3     0     1     6     2     1   307     6     0
  PBS     0     1    81     5    27    31   738     7
WDIFF     0     0     0     0     0     0     0    66
  + arg_next_line
    It allows arguments to be provided on the next line for some macros
    (.SH, .I, ..., .BR, ...)
    It works fine, but would require some cleanup (lots of redundant
    code).
    It can be applied cleanly on CVS, but require the 'nested_fonts' patch
    to operate cleanly.
    Here are the results of the regression tests for this patch (with the
    previous patch also applied):
        IGN    OK   OK2  WOK1  WOK2  WOK3   PBS WDIFF
  IGN  1698     0     0     0     0     0     0     0
   OK     0   125     0     0     0     0     0     0
  OK2     0     0  1567     1     0     0     0     2
 WOK1     0     0     0    97     0     1     0     0
 WOK2     0     0     0     0   209     0     0     0
 WOK3     0     2    11     2     4   301     3     0
  PBS     0     1   109     9    34    32   692    13
WDIFF     0     0     0     0     0     0     0    66
    (here most of the new 'WDIFF' man pages are bug in the man page, and a
    bug was filed in the BTS)
  + dot_lines
    po4a generated some lines starting with a dot. In those cases, a \&
    should be added to allow the line to be displayed. (for exemple:
    .I ../file
    is displayed in groff, but
    \fI../fil/\fR won't be displayed
    It also fix the same issue for lines starting by a "'"
        IGN    OK   OK2  WOK1  WOK2  WOK3   PBS WDIFF
  IGN  1698     0     0     0     0     0     0     0
   OK     0   125     0     0     0     0     0     0
  OK2     0     0  1570     0     0     0     0     0
 WOK1     0     8     0    90     0     0     0     0
 WOK2     0     0     0     0   209     0     0     0
 WOK3     0     0     0     0     0   323     0     0
  PBS     0     0     0     0     0     0   890     0
WDIFF     0     1     5     0     0     0     0    60
  + hyphen
    I had a obligation to fix this because I said Martin that replacing
    hyphens by minus signs were always allowed.
    In fact, it should not be modified in
      - .so/.mso arguments
      - after a \s (font size modifier, e.g. \s-2)
    I also added a comment on why I *hate* hyphens.
    Here are the results of the regression tests for this patch:
        IGN    OK   OK2  WOK1  WOK2  WOK3   PBS WDIFF
  IGN  1698     0     0     0     0     0     0     0
   OK     0   125     0     0     0     0     0     0
  OK2     0     0  1570     0     0     0     0     0
 WOK1     0     0     0    98     0     0     0     0
 WOK2     0     0     0     0   209     0     0     0
 WOK3     0     0     0     0     0   323     0     0
  PBS     0     0     0     0     0     0   890     0
WDIFF     0     0     2     1     3     5     0    55
  + new_macros
    Some new macros:
      .R
      .EX and .EE
      .so and .mso
      .cs
      minimal support (when no argument is given) for:
        .ce
        .ul
        .cu
    Here are the results of the regression tests for this patch:
        IGN    OK   OK2  WOK1  WOK2  WOK3   PBS WDIFF
  IGN  1698     0     0     0     0     0     0     0
   OK     0   125     0     0     0     0     0     0
  OK2     0     0  1570     0     0     0     0     0
 WOK1     0     0     0    98     0     0     0     0
 WOK2     0     0     0     0   209     0     0     0
 WOK3     0     0     0     0     0   323     0     0
  PBS     0    27    11     0     0     1   843     8
WDIFF     0     0     0     0     0     0     0    66
  + escape
    It tries to deal with the \c escape.
    It still need some work.
  + others
    some other minor points that I could isolate from my working directory
  + split_args
    This fix an issue for the limits.conf man page.
    It was also reported in #268904
    It adds one string for the translation.
  + all
    all the above patch, and more.
    It also contains some comments that should be removed.
    The results are presented in the first table.
Comments (and commits;) are welcome.
Thanks for those who read this mail to the end,
-- 
Nekral