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MAN(1) General Commands Manual MAN(1)
NAME
man - display the on-line manual pages (aka "man pages")
SYNOPSIS
man [-aclw|-h] [-C file] [-M path] [-m path] [-S srch] [[-s] section]
name ...
man [-C file] -f command ...
man [-C file] -k keyword ...
man -p
DESCRIPTION
The man utility displays the manual pages named on the command line. Its
options are as follows:
-a Display all of the man pages for a specified section and name
combination. (Normally, only the first man page found is
displayed.)
-C file Use the specified file instead of the default configuration
file. This permits users to configure their own man
environment. See man.conf(5) for a description of the
contents of this file.
-c Copy the man page to the standard output instead of using
more(1) to paginate it. This is done by default if the
standard output is not a terminal device.
-f command Synonym for whatis(1). It searches man pages for command in
their names and displays header lines from all matching
pages.
-h Display only the "SYNOPSIS" lines of the requested man pages.
For commands, this is typically the command line usage
information. For library functions, this usually contains
the required include files and function prototypes.
-k keyword Search man pages for keyword(s), in the same manner as
apropos(1).
-l Interpret all arguments as absolute or relative filenames of
the manual page files to display. No search is done and the
options -M, -m, and -S are ignored.
-M path Override the list of standard directories which man searches
for man pages. The supplied path must be a colon (":")
separated list of directories. This search path may also be
set using the environment variable MANPATH. The
subdirectories to be searched, and their search order, is
specified by the "_subdir" line in the man configuration
file.
-m path Augment the list of standard directories which man searches
for man pages. The supplied path must be a colon (":")
separated list of directories. These directories will be
searched before the standard directories or the directories
specified using the -M option or the MANPATH environment
variable. The subdirectories to be searched, and their
search order, is specified by the "_subdir" line in the man
configuration file.
-p Print the search path for the manual pages.
-s section Restrict the directories that man will search to the
specified section. The man configuration file (see
man.conf(5)) specifies the possible section values that are
currently available.
-S srch Display only man pages that have the specified string srch in
the directory part of their filenames. This allows the man
page search process criteria to be narrowed without having to
change the MANPATH or "_default" variables.
-w List the pathnames of the man pages which man would display
for the specified section and name combination.
If the `-s' option is not specified, there is more than one argument, the
`-k' option is not used, and the first argument is a valid section, then
that argument will be used as if specified by the `-s' option.
If name is given with a full path (beginning with `/') or a relative path
that begins with `./' or `../', then man interprets it as a file
specification, so that you can do man ./foo.5 or even man
/cd/foo/bar.1.gz. If name contains `/' but does not match one of the
above cases, then the search path is used; this allows you to request
machine-specific man pages, such as man vax/boot.
ENVIRONMENT
MACHINE As some man pages are intended only for specific architectures,
man searches any subdirectories, with the same name as the
current architecture, in every directory which it searches.
Machine-specific areas are checked before general areas. The
current machine type may be overridden by setting the
environment variable MACHINE to the name of a specific
architecture. Machine-specific man pages may also be requested
by prepending the relevant subdirectory name to the page name,
separated by `/'. (See also the "_<machine>" line in the
man.conf(5) configuration file, which defines additional
supplemental paths related to a specific machine type.)
MANPATH The standard search path used by man may be overridden by
specifying a path in the MANPATH environment variable. The
format of the path is a colon (":") separated list of
directories. The subdirectories to be searched as well as
their search order is specified by the "_subdir" line in the
man.conf(5) configuration file.
PAGER The pagination command used for writing the output. If the
PAGER environment variable is null or not set, the standard
pagination program more(1) will be used.
FILES
/etc/man.conf default man configuration file.
SEE ALSO
apropos(1), whatis(1), whereis(1), man.conf(5), mdoc(7), mdoc.samples(7)
STANDARDS
man conforms to X/Open Commands and Utilities Issue 5 ("XCU5").
BUGS
The on-line man pages are, by necessity, forgiving toward stupid display
devices, causing a few man pages to be not as nicely formatted as their
typeset counterparts.
NetBSD 11.99 November 29, 2024 NetBSD 11.99