makeinfo swallows page breaks

[Ludovic Courtès]

Hello,

Guile (ab)uses ‘makeinfo’ to generate a file, guile-procedures.txt, from
Texinfo.  That file is then read at run-time to get docstrings for
Guile’s primitives.

The input looks like this (note the page breaks, aka. ^L):

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---

acons
@c snarfed from alist.c:40
@deffn {Scheme Procedure} acons key value alist
Add a new key-value pair to @var{alist}.  A new pair is
created whose car is @var{key} and whose cdr is @var{value}, and the
pair is consed onto @var{alist}, and the new list is returned.  This
function is @emph{not} destructive; @var{alist} is not modified.
@end deffn

sloppy-assq
@c snarfed from alist.c:54
@deffn {Scheme Procedure} sloppy-assq key alist
Behaves like @code{assq} but does not do any error checking.
Recommended only for use in Guile internals.
@end deffn

--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

With Texinfo 4.3, page breaks are preserved:

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
This is guile-procedures.txt, produced by makeinfo version 4.13 from
guile-procedures.texi.

acons

 -- Scheme Procedure: acons key value alist
     Add a new key-value pair to ALIST.  A new pair is created whose
     car is KEY and whose cdr is VALUE, and the pair is consed onto
     ALIST, and the new list is returned.  This function is _not_
     destructive; ALIST is not modified.

   sloppy-assq

 -- Scheme Procedure: sloppy-assq key alist
     Behaves like `assq' but does not do any error checking.
     Recommended only for use in Guile internals.

--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

With Texinfo 5.[01], page breaks vanish:

--8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8---
This is guile-procedures.txt, produced by makeinfo version 5.1 from
guile-procedures.texi.

acons
 -- Scheme Procedure: acons key value alist
     Add a new key-value pair to ALIST.  A new pair is created whose car
     is KEY and whose cdr is VALUE, and the pair is consed onto ALIST,
     and the new list is returned.  This function is _not_ destructive;
     ALIST is not modified.

   sloppy-assq
 -- Scheme Procedure: sloppy-assq key alist
     Behaves like 'assq' but does not do any error checking.
     Recommended only for use in Guile internals.
--8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8---

Unfortunately, those page breaks are used by Guile’s docstring parser to
determine procedure boundaries.

Would it be possible to reinstate previous behavior–i.e., to preserve
page breaks?

Alternately, would you suggest using a different approach?

Thanks,
Ludo’.