Just say that the databases are intended for use by apropos(1), whatis(1),

and man(1), without restricting that statement to "man -k".
Suggested by and patch OK'ed by jmc@.

While only apropos(1) and whatis(1) strictly require the database
and while our man(1) implementation can find many manual pages even
when no database is available or when the database is incomplete or
corrupt, it does use the database even without -k whenever possible.
Consequently, this change makes the manual page less confusing.

diff --git a/makewhatis.8 b/makewhatis.8
index 9f307a351d3dc8ae59ae8d13f102a1e79779f7d9..3c79d727bbee16c773ea0a2b637ee6cd52ab22fa 100644 (file)
--- a/makewhatis.8
+++ b/makewhatis.8
@@ -1,4 +1,4 @@
-.\"    $Id: makewhatis.8,v 1.6 2017/05/17 22:27:12 schwarze Exp $
+.\" $Id: makewhatis.8,v 1.7 2022/03/16 23:26:14 schwarze Exp $
 .\"
 .\" Copyright (c) 2011, 2012 Kristaps Dzonsons <kristaps@bsd.lv>
 .\" Copyright (c) 2011, 2012, 2014, 2017 Ingo Schwarze <schwarze@openbsd.org>
@@ -15,7 +15,7 @@
 .\" ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING OUT OF
 .\" OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE.
 .\"
-.Dd $Mdocdate: May 17 2017 $
+.Dd $Mdocdate: March 16 2022 $
 .Dt MAKEWHATIS 8
 .Os
 .Sh NAME
@@ -52,9 +52,7 @@ manuals and indexes them in a database for fast retrieval by
 .Xr apropos 1 ,
 .Xr whatis 1 ,
 and
-.Xr man 1 Ns 's
-.Fl k
-option.
+.Xr man 1 .
 .Pp
 By default,
 .Nm