when do you usually use the man page for a complex command line tool to answer a question you have?
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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'm reading the manpage, it's probably because I'm looking for the exact name/syntax of some rarely-used (usually non-posix) command-line argument or setting and --help elided it.
For trying to learn some larger concept, I find that prose on websites works better.
For trying to figure out what's /really/ supported (eg, an envvar default for some --switch or alternate config file search locations), I'll probably find the git repo and read the argument parser / config loader.
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@b0rk I do use them pretty often. But it’s usually very hard to find what I want, especially for complex questions. Simpler tools have more useful man pages, more complex tools are basically so comprehensive that every word in the English language is in them so you can’t find anything
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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 I think my algorithm is roughly:
If I imagine there's probably a flag that does exactly what I want, or I know there's a flag and I need to remember a detail (e.g. what the flag is called, what the valid options are for it, etc) I'll look in the manpage (and/or --help).
Otherwise I will look elsewhere, and probably never even fall back to the manpage.
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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 I like the convenience and predictable UX of a man page. I can press Esc-H in my shell to open the man page for whatever command I have pending on the command line, and (assuming it has one) I know I can always expect plain text with consistent key bindings to page through it, search for keywords, etc. The biggest unknown is always the potential quality of a man page, but that’s also true for searching online, etc.
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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 can use grep to search the man pages and often get what I want much faster than a search engine will give me the same info.
I also find myself leaning even more heavily into man pages as the web becomes AI slop answers that may or may not show real commands and arguments.
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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 For much of my working life any one computer wasn't guaranteed to be on the internet -- I'm in and out of cleanrooms (and we don't want Russian hacker kids in our $100M hardware so definitely no internet there) and/or in the air trying to make some instrument work on some survey airplane. Now I'm retired but the habit is still to look locally first and only reach outward if that doesn't get me anywhere.
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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 use GNU Emacs to read manual pages. It has a builtin `man' command to display man pages. It also has hyperlinks to jump to. `man -k' and `appropos' helps for searching. More advanced `info' manuals are there if needed. Offline reading has its own benefits. My main issue is the man pages are very terse at the beginner level. But very smooth once we use a command more than 1 times.
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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 Man pages have a huge edge over searching the web in that they are generally part of whatever package provides the command they document. They aren’t for an earlier version or a different implementation. They are not usually written by people with weak understanding of the program.
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also it just occurred to me that the one time I wrote a command line tool (https://rbspy.github.io/) I didn't write a man page for it, I made a documentation website instead. I don't remember even considering writing a man page, probably because I rarely use man pages
(not looking to argue about whether command line tools "should" have man pages or not, just reflecting about how maybe I personally would prefer a good docs website over a man page. Also please no "webpages require internet")
@b0rk something I like about the fish shell is that the `help` command opens the bundled documentation site in your browser. It’s all local and pinned to the actual version you’re running. I would 100% take something like that for any CLI tool
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@b0rk Assuming the man page docset is properly curated, it should be a comprehensive an authoritative answer to how the tool works.
Caveat: I spent years in a techpubs department writing and maintaining UNIX man pages. I have strong opinions!
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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 I used to use manpages a lot but so much of the software I use doesn't have them, or doesn't have particularly meaningful or comprehensive content there, that I have learned to start looking elsewhere. Git is kind of the exception here, the manpages are pretty good.
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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 I find it's highly dependant on the use case. if it's just a quick check of syntax or similar, then yes help / man pages get hit first, but if it's a specific task I'm trying to do, and not sure of the best approach, then it's straight to google
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