xref: /netbsd-src/external/bsd/mdocml/dist/man.1 (revision bdc22b2e01993381dcefeff2bc9b56ca75a4235c)
1.\"	Id: man.1,v 1.21 2017/01/31 19:44:04 schwarze Exp
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3.\" Copyright (c) 1989, 1990, 1993
4.\"	The Regents of the University of California.  All rights reserved.
5.\" Copyright (c) 2003, 2007, 2008, 2014 Jason McIntyre <jmc@openbsd.org>
6.\" Copyright (c) 2010, 2011, 2014, 2015 Ingo Schwarze <schwarze@openbsd.org>
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32.\"     @(#)man.1	8.2 (Berkeley) 1/2/94
33.\"
34.Dd January 31, 2017
35.Dt MAN 1
36.Os
37.Sh NAME
38.Nm man
39.Nd display manual pages
40.Sh SYNOPSIS
41.Nm man
42.Op Fl acfhklw
43.Op Fl C Ar file
44.Op Fl I Cm os Ns = Ns Ar name
45.Op Fl K Ar encoding
46.Op Fl M Ar path
47.Op Fl m Ar path
48.Op Fl O Ar option Ns = Ns Ar value
49.Op Fl S Ar subsection
50.Op Fl s Ar section
51.Op Fl T Ar output
52.Op Fl W Ar level
53.Op Ar section
54.Ar name ...
55.Sh DESCRIPTION
56The
57.Nm
58utility
59displays the
60manual pages entitled
61.Ar name .
62Pages may be selected according to
63a specific category
64.Pq Ar section
65or
66machine architecture
67.Pq Ar subsection .
68.Pp
69The options are as follows:
70.Bl -tag -width Ds
71.It Fl a
72Display all matching manual pages.
73Normally, only the first page found is displayed.
74.It Fl C Ar file
75Use the specified
76.Ar file
77instead of the default configuration file.
78This permits users to configure their own manual environment.
79See
80.Xr man.conf 5
81for a description of the contents of this file.
82.It Fl c
83Copy the manual page to the standard output instead of using
84.Xr more 1
85to paginate it.
86This is done by default if the standard output is not a terminal device.
87.It Fl f
88A synonym for
89.Xr whatis 1 .
90It searches for
91.Ar name
92in manual page names and displays the header lines from all matching pages.
93The search is case insensitive and matches whole words only.
94This overrides any earlier
95.Fl k
96and
97.Fl l
98options.
99.It Fl h
100Display only the SYNOPSIS lines of the requested manual pages.
101Implies
102.Fl a
103and
104.Fl c .
105.It Fl I Cm os Ns = Ns Ar name
106Override the default operating system
107.Ar name
108for the
109.Xr mdoc 7
110.Ic \&Os
111and for the
112.Xr man 7
113.Ic \&TH
114macro.
115.It Fl K Ar encoding
116Specify the input encoding.
117The supported
118.Ar encoding
119arguments are
120.Cm us-ascii ,
121.Cm iso-8859-1 ,
122and
123.Cm utf-8 .
124By default, the encoding is automatically detected as described in the
125.Xr mandoc 1
126manual.
127.It Fl k
128A synonym for
129.Xr apropos 1 .
130Instead of
131.Ar name ,
132an expression can be provided using the syntax described in the
133.Xr apropos 1
134manual.
135By default, it displays the header lines of all matching pages.
136This overrides any earlier
137.Fl f
138and
139.Fl l
140options.
141.It Fl l
142A synonym for
143.Xr mandoc 1
144.Fl a .
145The
146.Ar name
147arguments are interpreted as filenames.
148No search is done and
149.Ar file ,
150.Ar path ,
151.Ar section ,
152and
153.Ar subsection
154are ignored.
155This overrides any earlier
156.Fl f ,
157.Fl k ,
158and
159.Fl w
160options.
161.It Fl M Ar path
162Override the list of standard directories which
163.Nm
164searches for manual pages.
165The supplied
166.Ar path
167must be a colon
168.Pq Ql \&:
169separated list of directories.
170This search path may also be set using the environment variable
171.Ev MANPATH .
172.It Fl m Ar path
173Augment the list of standard directories which
174.Nm
175searches for manual pages.
176The supplied
177.Ar path
178must be a colon
179.Pq Ql \&:
180separated list of directories.
181These directories will be searched before the standard directories or
182the directories specified using the
183.Fl M
184option or the
185.Ev MANPATH
186environment variable.
187.It Fl O Ar option Ns = Ns Ar value
188Comma-separated output options.
189For each output format, the available options are described in the
190.Xr mandoc 1
191manual.
192.It Fl S Ar subsection
193Restricts the directories that
194.Nm
195will search to those of a specific
196.Xr machine 1
197architecture.
198.Ar subsection
199is case insensitive.
200.Pp
201By default manual pages for all architectures are installed.
202Therefore this option can be used to view pages for one
203architecture whilst using another.
204.Pp
205This option overrides the
206.Ev MACHINE
207environment variable.
208.It Oo Fl s Oc Ar section
209Only select manuals from the specified
210.Ar section .
211The currently available sections are:
212.Pp
213.Bl -tag -width "localXXX" -offset indent -compact
214.It 1
215General commands
216.Pq tools and utilities .
217.It 2
218System calls and error numbers.
219.It 3
220Library functions.
221.It 3p
222.Xr perl 1
223programmer's reference guide.
224.It 4
225Device drivers.
226.It 5
227File formats.
228.It 6
229Games.
230.It 7
231Miscellaneous information.
232.It 8
233System maintenance and operation commands.
234.It 9
235Kernel internals.
236.El
237.It Fl T Ar output
238Select the output format.
239The default is
240.Cm locale .
241The other output modes
242.Cm ascii ,
243.Cm html ,
244.Cm lint ,
245.Cm man ,
246.Cm pdf ,
247.Cm ps ,
248.Cm tree ,
249and
250.Cm utf8
251are described in the
252.Xr mandoc 1
253manual.
254.It Fl W Ar level
255Specify the minimum message
256.Ar level
257to be reported on the standard error output and to affect the exit status.
258The
259.Ar level
260can be
261.Cm warning ,
262.Cm error ,
263or
264.Cm unsupp ;
265.Cm all
266is an alias for
267.Cm warning .
268By default,
269.Nm
270is silent.
271See the
272.Xr mandoc 1
273manual for details.
274.It Fl w
275List the pathnames of the manual pages which
276.Nm
277would display for the specified
278.Ar section
279and
280.Ar name
281combination.
282.El
283.Pp
284Guidelines for writing
285man pages can be found in
286.Xr mdoc 7 .
287.Pp
288If both a formatted and an unformatted version of the same manual page,
289for example
290.Pa cat1/foo.0
291and
292.Pa man1/foo.1 ,
293exist in the same directory, and at least one of them is selected,
294only the newer one is used.
295However, if both the
296.Fl a
297and the
298.Fl w
299options are specified, both file names are printed.
300.Sh ENVIRONMENT
301.Bl -tag -width MANPATHX
302.It Ev MACHINE
303As some manual pages are intended only for specific architectures,
304.Nm
305searches any subdirectories,
306with the same name as the current architecture,
307in every directory which it searches.
308Machine specific areas are checked before general areas.
309The current machine type may be overridden by setting the environment
310variable
311.Ev MACHINE
312to the name of a specific architecture,
313or with the
314.Fl S
315option.
316.Ev MACHINE
317is case insensitive.
318.It Ev MANPAGER
319Any non-empty value of the environment variable
320.Ev MANPAGER
321will be used instead of the standard pagination program,
322.Xr more 1 .
323If
324.Xr less 1
325is used, the interactive
326.Ic :t
327command can be used to go to the definitions of various terms, for
328example command line options, command modifiers, internal commands,
329environment variables, function names, preprocessor macros,
330.Xr errno 2
331values, and some other emphasized words.
332Some terms may have defining text at more than one place.
333In that case, the
334.Xr less 1
335interactive commands
336.Ic t
337and
338.Ic T
339can be used to move to the next and to the previous place providing
340information about the term last searched for with
341.Ic :t .
342.It Ev MANPATH
343The standard search path used by
344.Nm
345may be overridden by specifying a path in the
346.Ev MANPATH
347environment
348variable.
349The format of the path is a colon
350.Pq Ql \&:
351separated list of directories.
352.It Ev PAGER
353Specifies the pagination program to use when
354.Ev MANPAGER
355is not defined.
356If neither PAGER nor MANPAGER is defined,
357.Xr more 1
358.Fl s
359will be used.
360.El
361.Sh FILES
362.Bl -tag -width /etc/man.conf -compact
363.It Pa /etc/man.conf
364default man configuration file
365.El
366.Sh EXIT STATUS
367.Ex -std man
368.Sh SEE ALSO
369.Xr apropos 1 ,
370.Xr intro 1 ,
371.Xr whatis 1 ,
372.Xr whereis 1 ,
373.Xr intro 2 ,
374.Xr intro 3 ,
375.Xr intro 4 ,
376.Xr intro 5 ,
377.Xr man.conf 5 ,
378.Xr intro 6 ,
379.Xr intro 7 ,
380.Xr mdoc 7 ,
381.Xr intro 8 ,
382.Xr intro 9
383.Sh STANDARDS
384The
385.Nm
386utility is compliant with the
387.St -p1003.1-2008
388specification.
389.Pp
390The flags
391.Op Fl aCcfhIKlMmOSsTWw ,
392as well as the environment variables
393.Ev MACHINE ,
394.Ev MANPAGER ,
395and
396.Ev MANPATH ,
397are extensions to that specification.
398.Sh HISTORY
399A
400.Nm
401command first appeared in
402.At v3 .
403.Pp
404The
405.Fl w
406option first appeared in
407.At v7 ;
408.Fl f
409and
410.Fl k
411in
412.Bx 4 ;
413.Fl M
414in
415.Bx 4.3 ;
416.Fl a
417in
418.Bx 4.3 Tahoe ;
419.Fl c
420and
421.Fl m
422in
423.Bx 4.3 Reno ;
424.Fl h
425in
426.Bx 4.3 Net/2 ;
427.Fl C
428in
429.Nx 1.0 ;
430.Fl s
431and
432.Fl S
433in
434.Ox 2.3 ;
435and
436.Fl I ,
437.Fl K ,
438.Fl l ,
439.Fl O ,
440and
441.Fl W
442in
443.Ox 5.7 .
444The
445.Fl T
446option first appeared in
447.At III
448and was also added in
449.Ox 5.7 .
450