.PP
Indentation is optional, you may use tabs or spaces.
+.SH NUMBER FORMATS
+Options that define an integer value can be specified as decimal (the default)
+or hexadecimal ("0x" prefix, upper- or lowercase letters are accepted).
+Locale-dependent strings (e.g. the thousands separator of the current locale)
+may also be accepted in locales other than "C".
+.PP
+Options that define a floating-point value can be specified as decimal (the
+default) or hexadecimal ("0x" prefix, upper- or lowercase letters are accepted).
+The radix character (decimal separator) in either case is locale-dependent,
+usually ".".
+
+.SH TIME FORMATS
+Unless stated otherwise, options that define a time are specified in seconds.
+The "s", "m", "h" and "d" suffixes may be used to automatically convert values
+given in seconds, minutes, hours or days (for instance, instead of configuring
+a rekey time of 4 hours as "14400" seconds, "4h" may be used).
+.PP
+There are some global options that don't accept these suffixes as they are
+configured as integer values in seconds or milliseconds, or even as
+floating-point numbers (e.g. the retransmission timeout). Options that accept
+the suffixes have a corresponding default value.
.SH REFERENCING OTHER SECTIONS
It is possible to inherit settings and sections from another section. This
.BR swanctl (8)
tool to load configurations and credentials into the strongSwan IKE daemon.
-For a description of the basic file syntax, including how to reference sections
-or split the configuration in multiple files by including other files, refer to
+For a description of the basic file syntax, including numer/time formats, or how
+to reference sections or split the configuration in multiple files by including
+other files, refer to
.BR strongswan.conf (5).
-.SH TIME FORMATS
-For all options that define a time, the time is specified in seconds. The
-.RI "" "s" ","
-.RI "" "m" ","
-.RI "" "h" ""
-and
-.RI "" "d" ""
-suffixes explicitly define the units for seconds, minutes, hours and days,
-respectively.
-
.SH SETTINGS
The following settings can be used to configure connections, credentials and
pools.