Chapter 4 Working with Man Pages

This section contains information about accessing Reference Manual (man) pages in the AnswerBook2 interface. It contains the following topics:

• "Manual Pages and the AnswerBook2 Product"

• "Man Pages Search Results Page"

• "Man Pages Table of Contents"

• "Man Pages Information Page"

Manual Pages and the AnswerBook2 Product

Manual (man) pages provide reference information for UNIX commands, utilities, programming functions, device drivers, and other functions. Man pages get their name from two places: Reference Manuals (where the information usually resides) and the man command (used on UNIX systems).

Starting with the release of the Solaris 7 operating environment, standard UNIX man pages (manual pages in reference format) can be written using SGML tags, rather than the traditional formats. SGML-sourced man pages are an integrated part of the AnswerBook2 environment and have a special interface for you to use. For more information about the man page interface, see:

• "Man Pages Search Results Page"

• "Man Pages Table of Contents"

• "Man Pages Information Page"

Man Pages Search Results Page

When you choose Man Pages by Keyword from the pop-up menu in the Search box, the AnswerBook2 system searches through the SGML-based man pages registered with the server. The resulting list shows all man pages (man page name and brief description) that appears to match what you entered.

The search results window displays a special icon to the left of each item listed. This icon indicates how closely the particular section matches your search criteria. The more filled the icon, the closer the match. For example, this icon indicates an almost certain match to your search criteria whereas this icon indicates about a 50% chance that the section contains a match to your search criteria.

If your search produced no matching results, the search results page displays a message that tells you no matches were found. Because the Man Pages by Keyword search only looks through SGML-based man pages, this message might indicate the man page is in a non-SGML book. In this case, try searching your Personal Library or the Complete Library to find the appropriate man page.

Man Pages Table of Contents

When you select a Reference Manual book from an AnswerBook2 library page, you see something that looks similar to a book's table of contents, but with two major differences:

• No expand or collapse icons -- Because of the specific nature of a man page table of contents, it shows all man pages within the book and does not allow you to expand it or collapse it.

• An alphabetical "jump table" -- Use this table to jump directly to a list of man pages that begin with the selected letter.

Man Pages Information Page

An AnswerBook2 man page looks similar to a man page you would see when you use the UNIX man command. However, the AnswerBook2 man page interface includes a "jump table" after the man page name. Clicking on the various items in the jump table (for example, DESCRIPTION) takes you directly to that location within the man page. The same functionality is provided by a similar jump table at the bottom of the man page scrolling window.