xref: /openbsd-src/usr.bin/mandoc/man.1 (revision fb8aa7497fded39583f40e800732f9c046411717)
1.\"	$OpenBSD: man.1,v 1.15 2016/07/01 20:23:29 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 $Mdocdate: July 1 2016 $
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 of the manual pages for a specified
73.Ar section
74and
75.Ar name
76combination.
77Normally, only the first manual page found is displayed.
78.It Fl C Ar file
79Use the specified
80.Ar file
81instead of the default configuration file.
82This permits users to configure their own manual environment.
83See
84.Xr man.conf 5
85for a description of the contents of this file.
86.It Fl c
87Copy the manual page to the standard output instead of using
88.Xr more 1
89to paginate it.
90This is done by default if the standard output is not a terminal device.
91.It Fl f
92A synonym for
93.Xr whatis 1 .
94It searches for
95.Ar name
96in manual page names and displays the header lines from all matching pages.
97The search is case insensitive and matches whole words only.
98This overrides any earlier
99.Fl k
100and
101.Fl l
102options.
103.It Fl I Cm os Ns = Ns Ar name
104Override the default operating system
105.Ar name
106for the
107.Xr mdoc 7
108.Ic \&Os
109and for the
110.Xr man 7
111.Ic \&TH
112macro.
113.It Fl h
114Display only the SYNOPSIS lines of the requested manual pages.
115Implies
116.Fl a
117and
118.Fl c .
119.It Fl K Ar encoding
120Specify the input encoding.
121The supported
122.Ar encoding
123arguments are
124.Cm us-ascii ,
125.Cm iso-8859-1 ,
126and
127.Cm utf-8 .
128By default, the encoding is automatically detected as described in the
129.Xr mandoc 1
130manual.
131.It Fl k
132A synonym for
133.Xr apropos 1 .
134Instead of
135.Ar name ,
136an expression can be provided using the syntax described in the
137.Xr apropos 1
138manual.
139By default, it displays the header lines of all matching pages.
140This overrides any earlier
141.Fl f
142and
143.Fl l
144options.
145.It Fl l
146A synonym for
147.Xr mandoc 1
148.Fl a .
149The
150.Ar name
151arguments are interpreted as filenames.
152No search is done and
153.Ar file ,
154.Ar path ,
155.Ar section ,
156and
157.Ar subsection
158are ignored.
159This overrides any earlier
160.Fl f ,
161.Fl k ,
162and
163.Fl w
164options.
165.It Fl M Ar path
166Override the list of standard directories which
167.Nm
168searches for manual pages.
169The supplied
170.Ar path
171must be a colon
172.Pq Ql \&:
173separated list of directories.
174This search path may also be set using the environment variable
175.Ev MANPATH .
176.It Fl m Ar path
177Augment the list of standard directories which
178.Nm
179searches for manual pages.
180The supplied
181.Ar path
182must be a colon
183.Pq Ql \&:
184separated list of directories.
185These directories will be searched before the standard directories or
186the directories specified using the
187.Fl M
188option or the
189.Ev MANPATH
190environment variable.
191.It Fl O Ar option Ns = Ns Ar value
192Comma-separated output options.
193For each output format, the available options are described in the
194.Xr mandoc 1
195manual.
196.It Fl S Ar subsection
197Restricts the directories that
198.Nm
199will search to those of a specific
200.Xr machine 1
201architecture.
202.Ar subsection
203is case insensitive.
204.Pp
205By default manual pages for all architectures are installed.
206Therefore this option can be used to view pages for one
207architecture whilst using another.
208.Pp
209This option overrides the
210.Ev MACHINE
211environment variable.
212.It Oo Fl s Oc Ar section
213Only select manuals from the specified
214.Ar section .
215The currently available sections are:
216.Pp
217.Bl -tag -width "localXXX" -offset indent -compact
218.It 1
219General commands
220.Pq tools and utilities .
221.It 2
222System calls and error numbers.
223.It 3
224Library functions.
225.It 3p
226.Xr perl 1
227programmer's reference guide.
228.It 4
229Device drivers.
230.It 5
231File formats.
232.It 6
233Games.
234.It 7
235Miscellaneous information.
236.It 8
237System maintenance and operation commands.
238.It 9
239Kernel internals.
240.El
241.It Fl T Ar output
242Select the output format.
243The default is
244.Cm locale .
245The other output modes
246.Cm ascii ,
247.Cm html ,
248.Cm lint ,
249.Cm man ,
250.Cm pdf ,
251.Cm ps ,
252.Cm tree ,
253and
254.Cm utf8
255are described in the
256.Xr mandoc 1
257manual.
258.It Fl W Ar level
259Specify the minimum message
260.Ar level
261to be reported on the standard error output and to affect the exit status.
262The
263.Ar level
264can be
265.Cm warning ,
266.Cm error ,
267or
268.Cm unsupp ;
269.Cm all
270is an alias for
271.Cm warning .
272By default,
273.Nm
274is silent.
275See the
276.Xr mandoc 1
277manual for details.
278.It Fl w
279List the pathnames of the manual pages which
280.Nm
281would display for the specified
282.Ar section
283and
284.Ar name
285combination.
286.El
287.Pp
288Guidelines for writing
289man pages can be found in
290.Xr mdoc 7 .
291.Pp
292If both a formatted and an unformatted version of the same manual page,
293for example
294.Pa cat1/foo.0
295and
296.Pa man1/foo.1 ,
297exist in the same directory, and at least one of them is selected,
298only the newer one is used.
299However, if both the
300.Fl a
301and the
302.Fl w
303options are specified, both file names are printed.
304.Sh ENVIRONMENT
305.Bl -tag -width MANPATHX
306.It Ev MACHINE
307As some manual pages are intended only for specific architectures,
308.Nm
309searches any subdirectories,
310with the same name as the current architecture,
311in every directory which it searches.
312Machine specific areas are checked before general areas.
313The current machine type may be overridden by setting the environment
314variable
315.Ev MACHINE
316to the name of a specific architecture,
317or with the
318.Fl S
319option.
320.Ev MACHINE
321is case insensitive.
322.It Ev MANPAGER
323Any non-empty value of the environment variable
324.Ev MANPAGER
325will be used instead of the standard pagination program,
326.Xr more 1 .
327If
328.Xr less 1
329is used, the interactive
330.Ic :t
331command can be used to go to the definitions of various terms, for
332example command line options, command modifiers, internal commands,
333and environment variables.
334.It Ev MANPATH
335The standard search path used by
336.Nm
337may be overridden by specifying a path in the
338.Ev MANPATH
339environment
340variable.
341The format of the path is a colon
342.Pq Ql \&:
343separated list of directories.
344.It Ev PAGER
345Specifies the pagination program to use when
346.Ev MANPAGER
347is not defined.
348If neither PAGER nor MANPAGER is defined,
349.Xr more 1
350.Fl s
351will be used.
352.El
353.Sh FILES
354.Bl -tag -width /etc/man.conf -compact
355.It Pa /etc/man.conf
356default man configuration file
357.El
358.Sh EXIT STATUS
359.Ex -std man
360.Sh SEE ALSO
361.Xr apropos 1 ,
362.Xr intro 1 ,
363.Xr whatis 1 ,
364.Xr whereis 1 ,
365.Xr intro 2 ,
366.Xr intro 3 ,
367.Xr intro 4 ,
368.Xr intro 5 ,
369.Xr man.conf 5 ,
370.Xr intro 6 ,
371.Xr intro 7 ,
372.Xr mdoc 7 ,
373.Xr intro 8 ,
374.Xr intro 9
375.Sh STANDARDS
376The
377.Nm
378utility is compliant with the
379.St -p1003.1-2008
380specification.
381.Pp
382The flags
383.Op Fl aCcfhIKlMmOSsTWw ,
384as well as the environment variables
385.Ev MACHINE ,
386.Ev MANPAGER ,
387and
388.Ev MANPATH ,
389are extensions to that specification.
390.Sh HISTORY
391A
392.Nm
393command first appeared in
394.At v3 .
395.Pp
396The
397.Fl w
398option first appeared in
399.At v7 ;
400.Fl f
401and
402.Fl k
403in
404.Bx 4 ;
405.Fl M
406in
407.Bx 4.3 ;
408.Fl a
409in
410.Bx 4.3 Tahoe ;
411.Fl c
412and
413.Fl m
414in
415.Bx 4.3 Reno ;
416.Fl h
417in
418.Bx 4.3 Net/2 ;
419.Fl C
420in
421.Nx 1.0 ;
422and
423.Fl s
424and
425.Fl S
426in
427.Ox 2.3 .
428