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MAN(1) BSD Reference Manual MAN(1)
NAME
man - display the on-line manual pages
SYNOPSIS
man [-achw] [-C file] [-M path] [-m path] [-s section] name ...
DESCRIPTION
The man utility displays the BSD manual pages entitled name.
The options are as follows:
-a Display all of the manual pages for a specified section and name
combination. (Normally, only the first manual page found is dis-
played.)
-C Use the specified file instead of the default configuration file.
This permits users to configure their own manual environment.
See man.conf(5) for a description of the contents of this file.
-c Copy the manual 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.
-h Display only the ``SYNOPSIS'' lines of the requested manual
pages.
-M Override the list of standard directories which man searches for
manual pages. The supplied path must be a colon (``:'') separat-
ed 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. Entries may be aliases de-
fined in the configuration file. Only entries which have no
slash character (``/'') are subject to aliasing.
-m Augment the list of standard directories which man searches for
manual pages. The supplied path must be a colon (``:'') separat-
ed list of directories. These directories will be searched be-
fore the standard directories or the directories specified using
the -M option or the MANPATH environment variable. The subdirec-
tories to be searched, and their search order, is specified by
the ``_subdir'' line in the man configuration file. Entries may
be aliases defined in the configuration file. Only entries which
have no slash character (``/'') are subject to aliasing.
-s Restrict the directories to section that man will search. For
historical reasons the -s flag is optional if section starts with
a digit ([0-9]). The man configuration file (see man.conf(5))
specifies the possible section values that are currently avail-
able.
-w List the pathnames of the manual pages which man would display
for the specified section and name combination.
ENVIRONMENT
MACHINE As some manual pages are intended only for specific architec-
tures, 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 environ-
ment variable MACHINE to the name of a specific architecture.
MANPATH The standard search path used by man may be overridden by spec-
ifying 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 configuration
file. Entries may be aliases defined in the configuration
file. Only entries which have no slash character (``/'') are
subject to aliasing.
PAGER Any value of the environment variable PAGER will be used in-
stead of the standard pagination program, more(1).
FILES
/etc/man.conf default man configuration file.
SEE ALSO
apropos(1), makewhatis(1), whatis(1), whereis(1), man.conf(5)
BUGS
The on-line manual pages are, by necessity, forgiving toward stupid dis-
play devices, causing a few manual pages to not as nicely formatted as
their typeset counterparts.
HISTORY
A man command appeared in Version 6 AT&T UNIX.
4th Berkeley Distribution January 2, 1994 2