Re: "man" command made easy?
On Sat, Jul 14, 2001 at 04:41:21AM -0000, john smith wrote:
> Hi,
>
> I was just wondering...I don't know if this topic is for this list but...is
> there a book or link somewhere that gives easier examples of how to do the
> correct syntax for "man" something. This probably won't be any problems to
> you unix gurus out there but if I wanted to do something and I do a "man"
> something, I get arcane (at least for me) explanations of how to use
> different options/parameters of that something but not giving me a simple
> example on how to do the command with the options I want correctly and I'd
> spend a lot of time figuring out the correct syntax instead of spending time
> with something else. it would certainly be nice for the "man" pages to
> include a simple example of a correct command's syntax and how to add
> options etc.. along with the lengthy explanation of all of the available
> commands options. might not be useful to you gurus out there but it
> certainly will help newbies to make the learning curve a little easier?
You're probably looking in the wrong place. Man pages are not meant
to be true manuals. As you've noticed, they're typically quite terse
and only really useful if you already have some knowledge of the
command. You'll find quite quite a bit more information (FAQ's,
examples, READMEs) in /usr/share/doc/.
--
Brian Nelson <nelson@bignachos.com>
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