https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679#c0
Summary: usability issues with man Classification: openSUSE Product: openSUSE 12.2 Version: Final Platform: Other OS/Version: Other Status: NEW Severity: Minor Priority: P5 - None Component: Documentation AssignedTo: ke@suse.com ReportedBy: aspiers@suse.com QAContact: ke@suse.com Found By: Development Blocker: ---
This bug has two parts - a minor behavioural issue, and a minor documentation issue.
As per FATE #303433, the default behaviour of man when there are multiple sections offering the requested man page was changed in June 2008. The old behaviour can be reverted by setting the MAN_POSIXLY_CORRECT environment variable.
Whilst this was an improvement on the prior situation, there seems to be a minor behavioural issue when two versions of the same man page are on the manpath, e.g.
$ manpath | tr : '\n' manpath: warning: $MANPATH set, ignoring /etc/manpath.config /home/adam/share/man /home/adam/.rvm/rubies/ruby-1.9.3-p194/share/man /home/adam/.rvm/man /opt/kde3/share/man /usr/local/man /usr/share/man /home/adam/.GIT/3rd-party/rvm/man $ ls -l ~/share/man/man1/git-commit.1 lrwxrwxrwx 1 adam users 46 Sep 26 13:19 /home/adam/share/man/man1/git-commit.1 -> ../../../.STOW/git/share/man/man1/git-commit.1 $ man -aw git-commit /usr/share/man/man1/git-commit.1.gz /home/adam/.STOW/git/share/man/man1/git-commit.1 $ man git-commit Man: find all matching manual pages (set MAN_POSIXLY_CORRECT to avoid this) * git-commit (1) git-commit (1+) Man: What manual page do you want? Man:
However, if I enter '1+' and hit Enter, I still get the version from /usr/share. Likewise,
$ man 1+ git-commit No manual entry for git-commit in section 1+
Perhaps I am wrong to expect this to work, which brings me onto the documentation issue: it is not clear how this is supposed to work, because while man-db-2.5.1-listall.dif patches src/man.c to introduce MAN_POSIXLY_CORRECT, it does not patch man/man1/man.man1 to correspondingly amend the documentation. So it would also be good if the changed behaviour and MAN_POSIXLY_CORRECT were documented. This would presumably help the patch get accepted upstream too.
(Incidentally I notice that 2.5.1 is 4 years behind the current version 2.6.3, so it might be worth refreshing at some point soon.)
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679#c
Karl Eichwalder ke@suse.com changed:
What |Removed |Added ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- CC| |ke@suse.com Component|Documentation |Other AssignedTo|ke@suse.com |bnc-team-screening@forge.pr | |ovo.novell.com QAContact|ke@suse.com |qa-bugs@suse.de
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679#c
Karl Eichwalder ke@suse.com changed:
What |Removed |Added ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- AssignedTo|bnc-team-screening@forge.pr |werner@suse.com |ovo.novell.com |
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679#c1
Dr. Werner Fink werner@suse.com changed:
What |Removed |Added ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Severity|Minor |Enhancement
--- Comment #1 from Dr. Werner Fink werner@suse.com 2012-10-25 11:56:35 UTC --- IMHO this one will not be accepted upstream and I'd like to drop it but our support people do insist on it as it seems to be useful. For version 2.6.3 see openSUSE:Factory. For accessing local manual page simply use
man -l /home/adam/.STOW/git/share/man/man1/git-commit.1
If you have an idea how to extend the patch to be able to display shadows of a standard manual page then let me know.
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679#c2
--- Comment #2 from Adam Spiers aspiers@suse.com 2012-10-25 12:09:45 UTC --- (In reply to comment #1)
IMHO this one will not be accepted upstream and I'd like to drop it but our support people do insist on it as it seems to be useful.
It's a nice feature to have the *option* of using, but yes I agree it is probably too disruptive to get accepted upstream as is.
I guess it would be more likely to be accepted if it didn't change the default behaviour but instead offered a new option (e.g. -A or --prompt-all) to provide our current default behaviour. Then SUSE distributions could retain the current default behaviour by adding
export MANOPT="--prompt-all"
into /etc/profile.d, and other distros would also have the option of switching the default if they wanted.
For version 2.6.3 see openSUSE:Factory.
Cool, thanks.
For accessing local manual page simply use
man -l /home/adam/.STOW/git/share/man/man1/git-commit.1
Sure, but that's too much typing ;-)
If you have an idea how to extend the patch to be able to display shadows of a standard manual page then let me know.
The first step would be to fix it so that entering '1+' at the interactive prompt uses the shadow. If there are multiple shadows then presumably we need something a bit cleverer, e.g. '1+1', '1+2' etc., or '5+1', '5+2' if there were multiple shadows of a page in section 5.
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679#c3
Dr. Werner Fink werner@suse.com changed:
What |Removed |Added ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Status|NEW |RESOLVED Resolution| |FIXED
--- Comment #3 from Dr. Werner Fink werner@suse.com 2012-10-29 12:57:09 UTC --- fixed
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679#c4
--- Comment #4 from Bernhard Wiedemann bwiedemann@suse.com 2012-10-29 14:00:08 CET --- This is an autogenerated message for OBS integration: This bug (786679) was mentioned in https://build.opensuse.org/request/show/139660 Factory / man
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679#c5
--- Comment #5 from Bernhard Wiedemann bwiedemann@suse.com 2014-07-31 11:00:14 CEST --- This is an autogenerated message for OBS integration: This bug (786679) was mentioned in https://build.opensuse.org/request/show/243107 Factory / man
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679
https://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679#c6
--- Comment #6 from Bernhard Wiedemann bwiedemann@suse.com 2014-08-01 08:00:11 CEST --- This is an autogenerated message for OBS integration: This bug (786679) was mentioned in https://build.opensuse.org/request/show/243107 Factory / man
http://bugzilla.novell.com/show_bug.cgi?id=786679
SMASH SMASH smash_bz@suse.de changed:
What |Removed |Added ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- Whiteboard| | maint:planned:update
-
bugzilla_noreply＠novell.com