whatis - display manual page descriptions



  • WHATIS(1)	  Manual pager utils	    WHATIS(1)
    
    
    
    NAME
           whatis - display manual page descriptions
    
    SYNOPSIS
           whatis  [-dlv?V]	 [-r|-w]  [-s  list] [-m sys-
           tem[,...]] [-M path]  [-L  locale]  [-C	file]
           name ...
    
    DESCRIPTION
           Each  manual  page  has	a  short  description
           available within it.  whatis searches the man-
           ual  page  names	 and displays the manual page
           descriptions of any name matched.
    
           name may contain wildcards (-w) or be a	regu-
           lar  expression (-r).  Using these options, it
           may be necessary to quote the name  or  escape
           (\)  the	 special characters to stop the shell
           from interpreting them.
    
           index databases are used	 during	 the  search,
           and are updated by the mandb program.  Depend-
           ing on your installation, this may be run by a
           periodic cron job, or may need to be run manu-
           ally  after  new	 manual	  pages	  have	 been
           installed.   To	produce	 an  old  style	 text
           whatis database from the relative index	data-
           base, issue the command:
    
           whatis  -M  manpath  -w	'*'  |	sort  >	 man-
           path/whatis
    
           where manpath is a manual page hierarchy	 such
           as /usr/man.
    
    OPTIONS
           -d, --debug
    	      Print debugging information.
    
           -v, --verbose
    	      Print verbose warning messages.
    
           -r, --regex
    	      Interpret	  each	 name  as  a  regular
    	      expression.  If a name matches any part
    	      of  a  page name, a match will be made.
    	      This option causes whatis to  be	some-
    	      what  slower due to the nature of data-
    	      base searches.
    
           -w, --wildcard
    	      Interpret each name as a	pattern	 con-
    	      taining  shell  style wildcards.	For a
    	      match to be made, an expanded name must
    	      match   the  entire  page	 name.	 This
    	      option causes  whatis  to	 be  somewhat
    	      slower  due  to  the nature of database
    	      searches.
    
           -l, --long
    	      Do not  trim  output  to	the  terminal
    	      width.   Normally, output will be trun-
    	      cated to the terminal  width  to	avoid
    	      ugly  results  from poorly-written NAME
    	      sections.
    
           -s list, --sections list, --section list
    	      Search only the given manual  sections.
    	      list  is	a  colon-  or comma-separated
    	      list of sections.	 If an entry in	 list
    	      is  a  simple section, for example "3",
    	      then the displayed list of descriptions
    	      will  include  pages  in	sections "3",
    	      "3perl", "3x", and so on; while  if  an
    	      entry  in	 list  has  an extension, for
    	      example "3perl",	then  the  list	 will
    	      only  include  pages in that exact part
    	      of the manual section.
    
           -m system[,...], --systems=system[,...]
    	      If this  system  has  access  to	other
    	      operating	 system's  manual page names,
    	      they can be accessed using this option.
    	      To  search  NewOS's  manual page names,
    	      use the option -m NewOS.
    
    	      The system specified can be a  combina-
    	      tion  of comma delimited operating sys-
    	      tem names.  To include a search of  the
    	      native  operating	 system's manual page
    	      names, include the system name  man  in
    	      the  argument string.  This option will
    	      override the $SYSTEM environment	vari-
    	      able.
    
           -M path, --manpath=path
    	      Specify  an  alternate  set  of  colon-
    	      delimited manual	page  hierarchies  to
    	      search.	By  default,  whatis uses the
    	      $MANPATH environment  variable,  unless
    	      it  is empty or unset, in which case it
    	      will determine an	 appropriate  manpath
    	      based  on	 your $PATH environment vari-
    	      able.  This option overrides  the	 con-
    	      tents of $MANPATH.
    
           -L locale, --locale=locale
    	      whatis  will  normally  determine	 your
    	      current locale by a call to the C func-
    	      tion  setlocale(3)  which	 interrogates
    	      various environment variables, possibly
    	      including	 $LC_MESSAGES  and $LANG.  To
    	      temporarily  override  the   determined
    	      value,  use  this	 option	 to  supply a
    	      locale string directly to whatis.	 Note
    	      that  it will not take effect until the
    	      search for pages actually begins.	 Out-
    	      put  such	 as  the  help	message	 will
    	      always be displayed  in  the  initially
    	      determined locale.
    
           -C file, --config-file=file
    	      Use this user configuration file rather
    	      than the default of ~/.manpath.
    
           -?, --help
    	      Print a help message and exit.
    
           --usage
    	      Print a short usage message and exit.
    
           -V, --version
    	      Display version information.
    
    EXIT STATUS
           0      Successful program execution.
    
           1      Usage,  syntax  or  configuration	 file
    	      error.
    
           2      Operational error.
    
           16     Nothing was found that matched the cri-
    	      teria specified.
    
    ENVIRONMENT
           SYSTEM If $SYSTEM is set,  it  will  have  the
    	      same effect as if it had been specified
    	      as the argument to the -m option.
    
           MANPATH
    	      If $MANPATH is set, its value is inter-
    	      preted  as  the  colon-delimited manual
    	      page hierarchy search path to use.
    
           MANWIDTH
    	      If $MANWIDTH is set, its value is	 used
    	      as  the  terminal width (see the --long
    	      option).	If it is not set, the  termi-
    	      nal  width  will be calculated using an
    	      ioctl(2) if  available,  the  value  of
    	      $COLUMNS, or falling back to 80 charac-
    	      ters if all else fails.
    
    FILES
           /usr/share/man/index.(bt|db|dir|pag)
    	      A	 traditional  global  index  database
    	      cache.
    
           /var/cache/man/index.(bt|db|dir|pag)
    	      An  FHS compliant global index database
    	      cache.
    
           /usr/share/man/.../whatis
    	      A traditional whatis text database.
    
    SEE ALSO
           apropos(1), man(1), mandb(8)
    
    AUTHOR
           Wilf. ([email protected]).
           Fabrizio Polacco ([email protected]).
           Colin Watson ([email protected]).
    
    
    
    2.6.3		      2012-09-17	    WHATIS(1)
    

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