Manpage interpreter

[Sally Hines]

Hi Scott,

Thank you for the tips. This will be very helpful. I've instintively tried
some of this, scanning through, seeing if anything in the detailed sections
looks like it addresses any or my issues. 

Sally Hines

-----Original Message-----
From: Scott Emerson Longley [mailto:emerson at WPI.EDU] 
Sent: Thursday, December 23, 2004 8:42 PM
To: Sally Hines
Cc: 'Tyler Gee'; 'Mervin McDougall'; freebsd-newbies at freebsd.org
Subject: RE: Manpage interpreter




On Thu, 23 Dec 2004, Sally Hines wrote:

> I want to thank everyone for offering me good information on 
> automating the ports update. My real question, though, is how to read 
> and understand manpages. Where is the interpreter? I know I am not the 
> only noob to ever have this problem? I can solve my own problems much 
> better if I can interpret the instructions.
> 
> Thank you again,
> 
> Sally Hines

Finding good documentation can be a really big challenge. I've had success
with a multi-pronged approach involving many sources. However, for those
times when manpages are best, I've found that there are certain sections
that are immediately useful, and they're mostly near the bottom. If there's
an "examples" section, it's likely to prove relevant to simple queries. If
you're not sure you're looking at the right page, skip straight to the "see
also" section to get your bearings. --generally, if I don't see see
something at the top that seems immediately relevant, I skip straight to all
the little sections at the bottom before digging into the middle. Even a
one-liner "history" section has occasionally given me some context that I
needed. Also, try searching the manpage for words relevent to your question
(type "/", then a word).

Different Unix-derived sytems have similar commands, so it might also be 
useful to check out their manpages, if you have access to them. 

Having said all that, often, the right book will save lots of time. I figure
that when someone has bothered to put a cohesive chapter together that
covers the subject of your question, that's worth an awful lot. The FreeBSD
Handbook is the obvious choice for a book (and a good choide, I believe). If
you like examples (and have non-FreeBSD-specific questions), I highly
reccomend "Unix Power Tools". Also, "Absolute BSD" provides a nice refrain
from the often overly-detail-oriented nature of manpages.

I hope my scatter-brained answer is helpful :-)

			-Scott Longley