Differences between version 6 and predecessor to the previous major change of ManNotes.
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| Newer page: | version 6 | Last edited on Tuesday, April 17, 2007 12:20:25 pm | by BenStaz | Revert |
| Older page: | version 1 | Last edited on Saturday, December 30, 2006 11:25:40 am | by BenStaz | Revert |
@@ -1,7 +1,77 @@
+!Must Read
+
+I think a lot of people use the man command without knowing they can specify a section number to get more relevant information.
+
+For example a person without the knowledge of man sections may want to know the structure of the 'passwd' file and type 'man passwd'. They receive a page telling them all about the 'passwd' command and they assume the information they seek is not available using man, when really it is.
+
+Thanks to : http://www.linux-tutorial.info
+
+When referring to a particular command in Linux documentation, you very often will see the name followed by a letter or number in parenthesis, such as ls(1). This indicates that the ls command can be found in section 1 of the man-pages. This dates back to the time when man-pages came in books (as they often still do). By including the section, you could more quickly find what you were looking for.
+
+For a list of what sections are available, see the table below or the man man-page. If you are looking for the man-page of a particular command and know what section it is in, it is often better to specify the section. Sometimes there are multiple man-pages in different sections. For example, the passwd man-page in section 1 lists the details of the passwd command. The passwd man-page in section 5, lists the details of the /etc/passwd file. Therefore,if you wanted the man-page on the passwd file, you would use:
+
+*man 5 passwd
+
+Here is a list of the sections and a brief description of what can be found in each section:
+
+1) Commands, Utilities and other executable programs, which are typically user-related
+2) System calls
+3) Library calls
+4) Special files, typically device files in /dev
+5) File formats and their respective conventions, layout
+6) Games
+7) Macro packages
+8) System administration commands
+9) Kernel routines
+
+!Not happy with your default man viewer?
+
+Then change it! This is easily done by setting the 'PAGER' environment variable.
+
+I am using Debian Etch which by default uses 'less' as the man viewer.
+But say I want to use 'more' to view man pages instead.
+
+*export PAGER="/path/to/more"
+
+Now type 'man ls' for example, and notice the man viewer has changed :)
+
+If you regret the change simply do:
+
+*unset PAGER
+
+to revert back to the default man page viewer.
+
+Remember, to make changes to an environment variable permanent you will have to add the export command to your shell initialization script.
+
!You can Search a man Document
+
+Note: This only applies when using 'less' to view man pages.
When viewing a man for a particular application, you can search for a keyword you are after by typing:
*/<search>
The man will scroll down to the first match, and any matches will be highlighted!
+
+To search backwards:
+
+*?<search>
+
+!Help I forgot the name of a command!
+
+In the man command you can specify a keyword to search for inside the description of the command you are looking for.
+For example if you remembered the application had something to do with partitioning:
+
+*man -k partition
+
+Results in:
+
+<verbatim>
+cfdisk (8) - Curses based disk partition table manipulator for Linux
+fdisk (8) - Partition table manipulator for Linux
+parted (8) - a partition manipulation program
+partprobe (8) - inform the OS of partition table changes
+sfdisk (8) - Partition table manipulator for Linux
+</verbatim>
+
+With a bit of luck you will find the name of the application you are after :)
