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1 .\" $Id: man.1,v 1.10 2014/12/28 14:42:27 schwarze Exp $
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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 Ingo Schwarze <schwarze@openbsd.org>
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32 .\" @(#)man.1 8.2 (Berkeley) 1/2/94
33 .\"
34 .Dd $Mdocdate: December 28 2014 $
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 acfhklVw
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
56 The
57 .Nm
58 utility
59 displays the
60 manual pages entitled
61 .Ar name .
62 Pages may be selected according to
63 a specific category
64 .Pq Ar section
65 or
66 machine architecture
67 .Pq Ar subsection .
68 .Pp
69 The options are as follows:
70 .Bl -tag -width Ds
71 .It Fl a
72 Display all of the manual pages for a specified
73 .Ar section
74 and
75 .Ar name
76 combination.
77 Normally, only the first manual page found is displayed.
78 .It Fl C Ar file
79 Use the specified
80 .Ar file
81 instead of the default configuration file.
82 This permits users to configure their own manual environment.
83 See
84 .Xr man.conf 5
85 for a description of the contents of this file.
86 .It Fl c
87 Copy the manual page to the standard output instead of using
88 .Xr more 1
89 to paginate it.
90 This is done by default if the standard output is not a terminal device.
91 .It Fl f
92 A synonym for
93 .Xr whatis 1 .
94 It searches for
95 .Ar name
96 in manual page names and displays the header lines from all matching pages.
97 The search is case insensitive and matches whole words only.
98 This overrides any earlier
99 .Fl k
100 and
101 .Fl l
102 options.
103 .It Fl I Cm os Ns = Ns Ar name
104 Override the default operating system
105 .Ar name
106 for the
107 .Xr mdoc 7
108 .Ic \&Os
109 and for the
110 .Xr man 7
111 .Ic \&TH
112 macro.
113 .It Fl h
114 Display only the SYNOPSIS lines of the requested manual pages.
115 Implies
116 .Fl a
117 and
118 .Fl c .
119 .It Fl K Ar encoding
120 Specify the input encoding.
121 The supported
122 .Ar encoding
123 arguments are
124 .Cm us-ascii ,
125 .Cm iso-8859-1 ,
126 and
127 .Cm utf-8 .
128 By default, the encoding is automatically detected as described in the
129 .Xr mandoc 1
130 manual.
131 .It Fl k
132 A synonym for
133 .Xr apropos 1 .
134 Instead of
135 .Ar name ,
136 an expression can be provided using the syntax described in the
137 .Xr apropos 1
138 manual.
139 By default, it displays the header lines of all matching pages.
140 This overrides any earlier
141 .Fl f
142 and
143 .Fl l
144 options.
145 .It Fl l
146 A synonym for
147 .Xr mandoc 1
148 .Fl a .
149 The
150 .Ar name
151 arguments are interpreted as filenames.
152 No search is done and
153 .Ar file ,
154 .Ar path ,
155 .Ar section ,
156 and
157 .Ar subsection
158 are ignored.
159 This overrides any earlier
160 .Fl f ,
161 .Fl k ,
162 and
163 .Fl w
164 options.
165 .It Fl M Ar path
166 Override the list of standard directories which
167 .Nm
168 searches for manual pages.
169 The supplied
170 .Ar path
171 must be a colon
172 .Pq Ql \&:
173 separated list of directories.
174 This search path may also be set using the environment variable
175 .Ev MANPATH .
176 The subdirectories to be searched, and their search order,
177 are specified by the
178 .Dq _subdir
179 line in the
180 .Nm
181 configuration file.
182 .It Fl m Ar path
183 Augment the list of standard directories which
184 .Nm
185 searches for manual pages.
186 The supplied
187 .Ar path
188 must be a colon
189 .Pq Ql \&:
190 separated list of directories.
191 These directories will be searched before the standard directories or
192 the directories specified using the
193 .Fl M
194 option or the
195 .Ev MANPATH
196 environment variable.
197 The subdirectories to be searched, and their search order,
198 are specified by the
199 .Dq _subdir
200 line in the
201 .Nm
202 configuration file.
203 .It Fl O Ar option Ns = Ns Ar value
204 Comma-separated output options.
205 For each output format, the available options are described in the
206 .Xr mandoc 1
207 manual.
208 .It Fl S Ar subsection
209 Restricts the directories that
210 .Nm
211 will search to those of a specific
212 .Xr machine 1
213 architecture.
214 .Ar subsection
215 is case insensitive.
216 .Pp
217 By default manual pages for all architectures are installed.
218 Therefore this option can be used to view pages for one
219 architecture whilst using another.
220 .Pp
221 This option overrides the
222 .Ev MACHINE
223 environment variable.
224 .It Xo
225 .Op Fl s
226 .Ar section
227 .Xc
228 Restricts the directories that
229 .Nm
230 will search to a specific section.
231 The currently available sections are:
232 .Pp
233 .Bl -tag -width "localXXX" -offset indent -compact
234 .It 1
235 General commands
236 .Pq tools and utilities .
237 .It 2
238 System calls and error numbers.
239 .It 3
240 Libraries.
241 .It 3f
242 Fortran programmer's reference guide.
243 .It 3p
244 .Xr perl 1
245 programmer's reference guide.
246 .It 4
247 Device drivers.
248 .It 5
249 File formats.
250 .It 6
251 Games.
252 .It 7
253 Miscellaneous.
254 .It 8
255 System maintenance and operation commands.
256 .It 9
257 Kernel internals.
258 .It X11
259 An alias for X11R6.
260 .It X11R6
261 X Window System.
262 .It local
263 Pages located in
264 .Pa /usr/local .
265 .It n
266 Tcl/Tk commands.
267 .El
268 .Pp
269 The
270 .Nm
271 configuration file,
272 .Xr man.conf 5 ,
273 specifies the possible
274 .Ar section
275 values, and their search order.
276 Additional sections may be specified.
277 .It Fl T Ar output
278 Select the output format.
279 The default is
280 .Cm locale .
281 The other output modes
282 .Cm ascii ,
283 .Cm html ,
284 .Cm lint ,
285 .Cm man ,
286 .Cm pdf ,
287 .Cm ps ,
288 .Cm tree ,
289 and
290 .Cm utf8
291 are described in the
292 .Xr mandoc 1
293 manual.
294 .It Fl V
295 Print version and exit.
296 .It Fl W Ar level
297 Specify the minimum message
298 .Ar level
299 to be reported on the standard error output and to affect the exit status.
300 The
301 .Ar level
302 can be
303 .Cm warning ,
304 .Cm error ,
305 or
306 .Cm fatal .
307 The default is
308 .Cm fatal ;
309 .Cm all
310 is an alias for
311 .Cm warning .
312 See the
313 .Xr mandoc 1
314 manual for details.
315 .It Fl w
316 List the pathnames of the manual pages which
317 .Nm
318 would display for the specified
319 .Ar section
320 and
321 .Ar name
322 combination.
323 .El
324 .Pp
325 Guidelines for writing
326 man pages can be found in
327 .Xr mdoc 7 .
328 .Pp
329 If both a formatted and an unformatted version of the same manual page,
330 for example
331 .Pa cat1/foo.0
332 and
333 .Pa man1/foo.1 ,
334 exist in the same directory, and at least one of them is selected,
335 only the newer one is used.
336 However, if both the
337 .Fl a
338 and the
339 .Fl w
340 options are specified, both file names are printed.
341 .Sh ENVIRONMENT
342 .Bl -tag -width MANPATHX
343 .It Ev MACHINE
344 As some manual pages are intended only for specific architectures,
345 .Nm
346 searches any subdirectories,
347 with the same name as the current architecture,
348 in every directory which it searches.
349 Machine specific areas are checked before general areas.
350 The current machine type may be overridden by setting the environment
351 variable
352 .Ev MACHINE
353 to the name of a specific architecture,
354 or with the
355 .Fl S
356 option.
357 .Ev MACHINE
358 is case insensitive.
359 .It Ev MANPAGER
360 Any non-empty value of the environment variable
361 .Ev MANPAGER
362 will be used instead of the standard pagination program,
363 .Xr more 1 .
364 .It Ev MANPATH
365 The standard search path used by
366 .Nm
367 may be overridden by specifying a path in the
368 .Ev MANPATH
369 environment
370 variable.
371 The format of the path is a colon
372 .Pq Ql \&:
373 separated list of directories.
374 The subdirectories to be searched, as well as their search order,
375 are specified by the
376 .Dq _subdir
377 line in the
378 .Nm
379 configuration file.
380 .It Ev PAGER
381 Specifies the pagination program to use when
382 .Ev MANPAGER
383 is not defined.
384 If neither PAGER nor MANPAGER is defined,
385 .Pa /usr/bin/more Fl s
386 will be used.
387 .El
388 .Sh FILES
389 .Bl -tag -width /etc/man.conf -compact
390 .It Pa /etc/man.conf
391 default man configuration file
392 .El
393 .Sh EXIT STATUS
394 .Ex -std man
395 .Sh SEE ALSO
396 .Xr apropos 1 ,
397 .Xr intro 1 ,
398 .Xr whatis 1 ,
399 .Xr whereis 1 ,
400 .Xr intro 2 ,
401 .Xr intro 3 ,
402 .Xr intro 4 ,
403 .Xr intro 5 ,
404 .Xr man.conf 5 ,
405 .Xr intro 6 ,
406 .Xr intro 7 ,
407 .Xr mdoc 7 ,
408 .Xr intro 8 ,
409 .Xr intro 9
410 .Sh STANDARDS
411 The
412 .Nm
413 utility is compliant with the
414 .St -p1003.1-2008
415 specification.
416 .Pp
417 The flags
418 .Op Fl aCcfhIKlMmOSsTVWw ,
419 as well as the environment variables
420 .Ev MACHINE ,
421 .Ev MANPAGER ,
422 and
423 .Ev MANPATH ,
424 are extensions to that specification.
425 .Sh HISTORY
426 A
427 .Nm
428 command first appeared in
429 .At v3 .
430 .Pp
431 The
432 .Fl w
433 option first appeared in
434 .At v7 ;
435 .Fl f
436 and
437 .Fl k
438 in
439 .Bx 4 ;
440 .Fl M
441 in
442 .Bx 4.3 ;
443 .Fl a
444 in
445 .Bx 4.3 Tahoe ;
446 .Fl c
447 and
448 .Fl m
449 in
450 .Bx 4.3 Reno ;
451 .Fl h
452 in
453 .Bx 4.3 Net/2 ;
454 .Fl C
455 in
456 .Nx 1.0 ;
457 and
458 .Fl s
459 and
460 .Fl S
461 in
462 .Ox 2.3 .