Re: debian-user-digest Digest V99 #802
On Tue, May 04, 1999 at 09:11:57AM -0700, weim0404@kettering.edu wrote:
>
> It's not exactly what you are looking for nor perfect but man -k keyword or
> man --apropos keyword already is similar to what your describing.
>
> doug
>
>
As a user who's new to linux, I'd just like to add my $0.02:
The "man -k" and "apropos" commands are a good idea sorely lacking in
execution. For example I type "man -k email" and get audiosend and showaudio
as results. Huh? Not a big deal, I'll just keep searching. Trying "man -k
e-mail" gets nothing, while "man -k mail" nets a list of 72 programs, only two
of which are what I'm looking for, mutt or elm. _I_ don't think any of the
search terms entered were unreasonable, yet only a specific one returned the
desired result, and that amongst a large amount of noise.
I don't know how the command works, but it seems to me that it depends too
much on what the author of the man page enters as keywords. Perhaps there is
a program that would allow for a searching of all the text in all the man
pages of a system (though that would be probably be dreadfully slow).
However I do understand the point that someone else brought up that you can't
expect to sit down and instantly become productive at a new OS.
Unfortunately I think the current setup makes learning linux more difficult
than it has to be.
MBG
--
"Infinite: Bigger than the biggest thing ever and then some. Much bigger than
that in fact, really amazingly immense, a totally stunning size, real "wow,
that's big," time. Infinity is just so big that, by comparison, bigness
itself looks really titchy. Gigantic multiplied by colossal multiplied by
staggeringly huge is the sort of concept we're trying to get across here."
-Douglas Adams 'The Restaurant at the End of the Universe'
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