when do you usually use the man page for a complex command line tool to answer a question you have?
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i think part of the reason I'm feeling interested in man pages right now even though I rarely use them is that search has gotten so much worse, it's frustrating, and it makes it feel more appealing to have trustworthy sources with clear explanations
@b0rk every time I know I'm going to get on a plane, the first thing I do is download documentation for all the devices/platforms/libraries I'm currently working on, and I always end up having a more productive session in the air than I would on the ground
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when do you usually use the man page for a complex command line tool to answer a question you have? (like git, openssl, rsync, curl, etc)
(edit: no need to say "i use --help then man")
@b0rk For me, it mostly depends on how much I know about the tool and how common/obscure and simple/complex I know the task is.
“How do I save curl output to a file instead of stdout” ==> `tldr`
“A webpage said to use the -U option, what does that mean?” ==> man page
“What even is this?” ==> man page
“I need to use ffmpeg” ==> web search 😶🌫️ -
@wader been trying out fx recently and I think it might work bette for mer, we'll see https://cheat.sh/
@b0rk 👍 good to hear, only used it briefly. happy to answer jq questions if you ever venture into it again
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@b0rk For me I think it's a composite of four things:
* old pre-good-search habits of reading manpages first, which also gives me lots of practice at navigating them.
* I often only want some specific piece of information (eg 'what switch is used for ...') that I can find with a search of the manpage in less
* Internet search has gotten untrustworthy and bad.
* Sometimes I want to see the authoritative 'what the program says' instead of people describing it. -
when do you usually use the man page for a complex command line tool to answer a question you have? (like git, openssl, rsync, curl, etc)
(edit: no need to say "i use --help then man")
If I'm just looking for what command-line option to use to do something I know or assume the tool can do, I'll often go first to the man page and browse down the list to see if I find it. Otherwise, I'll usually start by googling for an example.
I have tldr installed, but I rarely remember to use it.
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when do you usually use the man page for a complex command line tool to answer a question you have? (like git, openssl, rsync, curl, etc)
(edit: no need to say "i use --help then man")
@b0rk
If I want to know how to use a specific tool i use `man thetool` first (or after `thetool --help`). If I don't know which tool to use for a task, I might try som `apropos` queries, but I'd also reach for a web search. -
@fanf @tartley @b0rk TIL that Git's -h and --help do different things. What an unfortunate UI though :( It goes completely against the principle of long options and the established behavior of -h/--help in every other CLI tool, and even the git(1) man page claims that -h and --help are identical??
Very useful to know though. Previously, I used tricks like "git remote blarg" to get the short help, and was a little confused/surprised that there was no better way to see the short help text.
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@fanf @tartley @b0rk TIL that Git's -h and --help do different things. What an unfortunate UI though :( It goes completely against the principle of long options and the established behavior of -h/--help in every other CLI tool, and even the git(1) man page claims that -h and --help are identical??
Very useful to know though. Previously, I used tricks like "git remote blarg" to get the short help, and was a little confused/surprised that there was no better way to see the short help text.
@fanf @tartley @b0rk Oh, it's actually even worse! `git remote -h` shows the short help, but `git -h remote` outputs the man page.
`git remote --help`, `git --help remote`, and `git help remote` also all show the man page. So the specific spelling `git <command> -h` seems to be a special case. This is extremely unhelpful behavior for an option that's meant to be used when you don't know how to use a program... :(
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@simontatham yea i think part of the reason I'm newly interested in man pages right now is that search engines are so much worse than they used to be
@b0rk@social.jvns.ca @simontatham@hachyderm.io another aspect: the man page on your machine matches the software on your machine
the online docs are probably for the very latest version, which is probably not the one you're running
(I used to make this argument on IRC channels a couple of decades ago… so yes to the "old people" aspect, too) -
@b0rk for me, I think it's a combination of an 'old people' thing and a 'highly suspicious of a lot of the modern Internet' thing.
When I learned to use computers, competent search engines and rich online resources like Stack Exchange were a long way off – even having the Internet in your home without paying per minute wasn't around yet. So you had to develop the skills of finding stuff out from the available local resources like manuals, because that was all you had.
Then good search engines came along, but I was always aware that there's a risk of depending too much on them and losing the ability to figure stuff out yourself. Even now, I sometimes find myself coding without the Internet (or effectively so – laptop on train with terrible connectivity) and it's useful that I can still get things done.
And now search engines are all getting enshittified, and/or monetised, and/or straight-up _worse_ (Google doesn't return the results I actually wanted nearly as often as it used to). And the less said about 2020s answers to this kind of question, the better. So I'm doubly glad I haven't abandoned my old approaches to things. More and more I feel it's important to keep external corporately-provided "do it for you" services at arm's length, and not base your whole workflow on them to the extent that you're a captive market or dependent on them not going down.
@simontatham @b0rk yes this - I’m old enough to remember man pages that were actually printed out in A4 ring binders. They do have the advantage of not needing to wade through a dozen HowTo articles that answer the most basic usage to find documentation that actually covers the options you actually need.
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when do you usually use the man page for a complex command line tool to answer a question you have? (like git, openssl, rsync, curl, etc)
(edit: no need to say "i use --help then man")
@b0rk generally yes but there are exceptions. Looking up what a specific argument does is fine in 100% of the cases, but rsync and sudoers are the two examples that come to mind when it comes to obnoxiously inscrutable structure, if you came to the man page to learn how to use the thing specific way.
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i'm very curious about everyone who says "I'd look there first", if I want to figure out how to do something new I think I'll usually google how to do it rather than look at the man page, and then maybe later look at the man page to look up the details
(I've gotten enough of these answers:
- "I like that man pages don't require changing context"
- "with the man page I know I have the right version of the docs")@b0rk Not sure why, since I always look online for LaTeX documentation.
Possibly that was just how I was taught in the early 2000s when I first tried Linux? Possibly just it is RIGHT THERE and I don't need to open a browser or anything
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@b0rk@social.jvns.ca @simontatham@hachyderm.io another aspect: the man page on your machine matches the software on your machine
the online docs are probably for the very latest version, which is probably not the one you're running
(I used to make this argument on IRC channels a couple of decades ago… so yes to the "old people" aspect, too)@dakkar @b0rk @simontatham Another problem with Googling the answer is that most of the content it finds is for Ubuntu, and I don't have Ubuntu.
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i'm very curious about everyone who says "I'd look there first", if I want to figure out how to do something new I think I'll usually google how to do it rather than look at the man page, and then maybe later look at the man page to look up the details
(I've gotten enough of these answers:
- "I like that man pages don't require changing context"
- "with the man page I know I have the right version of the docs")@b0rk
I'm not sure how I choose, I _think_ I use man page first if I need just a specific detail like the name of an option I know is there. If I'm not sure of what I'm looking for, I go to Google. Man pages usually are not very good in introducing/explaining use cases, so not a good starting point, but for a specific detail, they tend to be predictably usable. -
when do you usually use the man page for a complex command line tool to answer a question you have? (like git, openssl, rsync, curl, etc)
(edit: no need to say "i use --help then man")
@b0rk Voted "other" as it depends highly on the context for me? Like, what tool, what kind of system am I running on, and so forth.
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@simontatham yea i think part of the reason I'm newly interested in man pages right now is that search engines are so much worse than they used to be
@b0rk @simontatham You've DEFINITELY given me something to think about.
In rsync's case in particular, I go to the HTML version of the man page on Samba's website and look it up there. I think if the man page was easier to invoke outside of a terminal window with browser/editor bindings (read: CTRL+F), I train my brain to use the local copy.
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@b0rk
It used to be --help, and I sometimes still use it (but frustrated from browsers etc. that don't comply to the convention) - no need to state that, but I found something more interesting:
Many tools come with bash completion when installed through a package manager.
So the first thing I really try nowadays is:
- type a few promising characters
- hit TAB
- if unsuccessful, delete some, type some new.
If this won't work, I might try the man page - or a google search, it depends.@b0rk
Now that I read your second question, I must also mention "tldr".
It often has a useful selection of those use cases that most users only ever use. If I want to something more advanced I have to research it somewhere else, anyway. -
when do you usually use the man page for a complex command line tool to answer a question you have? (like git, openssl, rsync, curl, etc)
(edit: no need to say "i use --help then man")
@b0rk man is my go-to tool when I sorta already know what I'm trying to do but can't quite remember what the arguments look like
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i'm very curious about everyone who says "I'd look there first", if I want to figure out how to do something new I think I'll usually google how to do it rather than look at the man page, and then maybe later look at the man page to look up the details
(I've gotten enough of these answers:
- "I like that man pages don't require changing context"
- "with the man page I know I have the right version of the docs")@b0rk So, this is a conditionalized problem, my P(man page first | man page exists) is high – because if it's a new tool, and it has a man page, usually the man page is *actually quite good*, and actually fulfills the role of "manual" better than most (say, GNU coreutils) manpages, which just are slightly more in-depth versions of `tool --help` (without the actual structural difference that would make them manuals, as opposed to CLI option references).
Lots of tools don't ship with manpages… -
@b0rk So, this is a conditionalized problem, my P(man page first | man page exists) is high – because if it's a new tool, and it has a man page, usually the man page is *actually quite good*, and actually fulfills the role of "manual" better than most (say, GNU coreutils) manpages, which just are slightly more in-depth versions of `tool --help` (without the actual structural difference that would make them manuals, as opposed to CLI option references).
Lots of tools don't ship with manpages…@b0rk … anymore (`man mlr` doesn't work, `mlr --help` directly links to its docs website). And for more complex tools, that's probably fair – you're not going to learn how to use a massive tool from man pages (examples of "this should not be one man page" is `man gcc`,`man bash, `fish-doc`, `libuv` or `man mplayer`), but for smaller things, authors who sit down to write a man page for modern tools typically actually *think* about what is a sensible thing to put in that format.
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@Voline ah, it was intentional, sorry 8-) I think this is the first time I've seen this made on purpose to avoid a preview, the usual strategy is to add an image or something, so that the link remains clickable. Sure would be nice if the preview card could be controlled 8-(
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re: https:
Yeah, sometimes I don't want a preview card to appear in a post.
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@mcc «this 1 could easily be a 5 with the right incentive, hint hint»
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Bigstonk Bureger
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@stefano This is an absolutely legitimate use case for CW. I find myself both hungry and hating you at the same time.
Cheers! 😎
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may I have a simple burger PLEASE, sir
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@mcc how much are they willing to pay
