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Annotated edit history of mandb(8) version 1, including all changes. View license author blame.
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1 perry 1 mandb
2 !!!mandb
3 NAME
4 SYNOPSIS
5 DESCRIPTION
6 DATABASE CACHES
7 OPTIONS
8 DIAGNOSTICS
9 FILES
10 SEE ALSO
11 AUTHOR
12 ----
13 !!NAME
14
15
16 mandb - create or update the manual page index caches
17 !!SYNOPSIS
18
19
20 __mandb__ [[__-dqsuc__|__-h__|__-V__]
21 [[''manpath'']
22 !!DESCRIPTION
23
24
25 __mandb__ is used to initialise or manually update
26 __index__ database caches that are usually maintained by
27 __man__. The caches contain information relevant to the
28 current state of the manual page system and the information
29 stored within them is used by the man_db utilities to
30 enhance their speed and functionality.
31
32
33 When creating or updating an __index__, __mandb__ will
34 warn of bad ROFF .so requests, bogus manual page filenames
35 and manual pages from which the __whatis__ cannot be
36 parsed.
37
38
39 Supplying __mandb__ with an optional colon-delimited path
40 will override the internal system manual page hierarchy
41 search path, determined from information found within the
42 man_db configuration file.
43 !!DATABASE CACHES
44
45
46 __mandb__ can be compiled with support for any one of the
47 following database types.
48
49
50 Those database types that support asynchronous updates provide enhanced speed at the cost of possible corruption in the event of unusual termination. In an unusual case where this has occured, it may be necessary to rerun __mandb__ with the __-c__ option to re-create the databases from scratch.
51 !!OPTIONS
52
53
54 __-d, --debug__
55
56
57 Produce debugging information.
58
59
60 __-q, --quiet__
61
62
63 Produce no warnings.
64
65
66 __-s, --no-straycats__
67
68
69 Do not spend time looking for or adding information to the
70 databases regarding stray cats.
71
72
73 __-p, --no-purge__
74
75
76 Do not spend time checking for deleted manual pages and
77 purging them from the databases.
78
79
80 __-c, --create__
81
82
83 By default, __mandb__ will try to update any previously
84 created databases. If a database does not exist, it will
85 create it. This option forces __mandb__ to delete
86 previous databases and re-create them from scratch, and
87 implies __--no-purge.__ This may be necessary if a
88 database becomes corrupt or if a new database storage scheme
89 is introduced in the future.
90
91
92 __-u, --user-db__
93
94
95 Create user databases only, even with write permissions
96 necessary to create system databases.
97
98
99 __-t, --test__
100
101
102 Perform correctness checks on manual pages in the hierarchy
103 search path. With this option, __mandb__ will not alter
104 existing databases.
105
106
107 __-h, --help__
108
109
110 Show the usage message, then exit.
111
112
113 __-V, --version__
114
115
116 Show the version, then exit.
117 !!DIAGNOSTICS
118
119
120 The following warning messages can be emitted during
121 database building.
122
123
124 __
125 __
126
127
128 An attempt to extract whatis line(s) from the given
129 WHATIS PARSING__ section in lexgrog(1)
130 for more information.
131
132
133 ____
134
135
136
137
138 __
139 __
140
141
142
143
144 __
145 __
146
147
148 The
149
150
151 __
152 __
153
154
155 The wildcard
156 !!FILES
157
158
159 ''/etc/manpath.config''
160
161
162 man_db configuration file.
163
164
165 ''/usr/man/index.(bt|db|dir|pag)''
166
167
168 A traditional global ''index'' database
169 cache.
170
171
172 ''/var/catman/index.(bt|db|dir|pag)''
173
174
175 An alternate or FSSTND compliant global ''index''
176 database cache.
177
178
179 ''/var/cache/man/index.(bt|db|dir|pag)''
180
181
182 An FHS compliant global ''index'' database
183 cache.
184 !!SEE ALSO
185
186
187 man(1), lexgrog(1), manpath(5),
188 catman(8).
189
190
191 The __WHATIS PARSING__ section formerly in this manual
192 page is now part of lexgrog(1).
193 !!AUTHOR
194
195
196 Wilf. (G.Wilford@ee.surrey.ac.uk).
197 Fabrizio Polacco (fpolacco@debian.org).
198 Colin Watson (cjwatson@debian.org).
199 ----
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