Post AMiNlBDg4rcyysRgHo by murks@social.tchncs.de
(DIR) More posts by murks@social.tchncs.de
(DIR) Post #AMgHiXJQLvx6GuVtNA by fribbledom@mastodon.social
2022-08-19T08:32:02Z
0 likes, 2 repeats
Remind me again, please. What's stopping us from dropping man-pages and their horrible ROFF format?We could at least convert them to Markdown and provide a convenient pager that's not stuck in the 70s.
(DIR) Post #AMgHiXuI8rRW7FlKq0 by fribbledom@mastodon.social
2022-08-19T09:04:57Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
There's a reason nobody reads man pages and nobody provides well written man pages anymore: they're horrible, for authors and users alike. They were literally designed to be printed on paper.Features I'd expect from a "modern" man system:- cross references- syntax highlighting- search- & browse-ability- actionable items- anchors
(DIR) Post #AMgI6TcBkcjFkqhpeS by izaya@social.shadowkat.net
2022-08-19T09:09:39.924332Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@fribbledom for a laugh I made a PDF of the entire manual from a running systemit came out to 18, 000 pages
(DIR) Post #AMgIGKUWWkdwM0oq24 by reitoei@shitposter.club
2022-08-19T09:11:30.814260Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@fribbledom I read man pages.... 😔
(DIR) Post #AMgIYvQ7xrDe6Gd6ky by mdhughes@appdot.net
2022-08-19T09:09:48Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@fribbledom The Kids Todayâ„¢ don't read man pages because they weren't taught to use the command line in the first place. For the original UNIX users, `apropos foo` or `man bar` is your first stop.
(DIR) Post #AMgIYvx5zHafkW3R8y by fribbledom@mastodon.social
2022-08-19T09:11:01Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
@mdhughes I do consider myself one of the "original UNIX users", but honestly... man pages are my absolute last resort.
(DIR) Post #AMgIbjYIXx8u9zn5eK by wolf480pl@mstdn.io
2022-08-19T09:15:16Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@fribbledom I find your take outrageous.People still read manpages, and some developers still write good ones (see swaywm).For me, manpages have been the most natural way to read documentation for the last 10 years. They're way better than a web browser, because I don't have to leave the terminal, they work offline, they document the version you have installed, etc.
(DIR) Post #AMgIbqQOzhzBTX9NoW by josemanuel@qoto.org
2022-08-19T09:15:22Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@fribbledom That’s what Info manuals were created for, and they’re much, much worse. Also, a lot of the features you’re missing are already present in man pages. At the very least, cross references, syntax highlighting and search- & browse-ability. They may not be there in the form you expect, but that’s another issue.To be honest, I quite like man pages and find them really useful.
(DIR) Post #AMgIp5FpAcLfETW1oG by wolf480pl@mstdn.io
2022-08-19T09:17:45Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@fribbledom Until I started dealing with cloud, the vast majority of software I dealt with had good manpages.With cloud stuff, they weren't replaced with web docs (those usually exist in parallel whether you have mabpages or not). They were replaced with --help (or docker help, kubectl explain, etc) which sucks because everyone does it differently.
(DIR) Post #AMgIqXgsvhTFiSruU4 by fribbledom@mastodon.social
2022-08-19T09:18:00Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@wolf480pl Oh, but I'm not asking to take man pages to the web. Everything I suggest is doable on the terminal, parsed from documentation that's packaged with the software.
(DIR) Post #AMgJFfW6y8abEDoIzo by mig@mastodon.1984.cz
2022-08-19T09:22:34Z
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@fribbledom and lots of examples, sometimes an example says more than words..
(DIR) Post #AMgJwXM5Bpu8MpYpO4 by wolf480pl@mstdn.io
2022-08-19T09:30:15Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@fribbledom well, if man suddenly started to have syntax highlighting, that'd be nice. With cross-references that are actually clickable (as opposed to "see signal(7)" ), doing it right without destroing the scrolling experience and becoming another GNU info would be hard IMO, but if you managed to figure out a way to do it, that'd be cool too.It should be possible to implement all theae features in a backwards-compatible way, whether through ROFF or some other format
(DIR) Post #AMgL9O1fHsAn9ShYOW by jmw150@mathstodon.xyz
2022-08-19T09:17:36Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
@fribbledom That is why "info", and other random stuff exists. Automatic documentation tools target things like man, or markdown, or html anyway.Simple standards allow the industry to have stability. So, I think this is dumb.
(DIR) Post #AMgMMKxm5NE9N5cYzo by herag@dobbs.town
2022-08-19T09:57:23Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@wolf480plMan.... manpages are essential. Maybe there is room for improvement, but I dunno, I have never been disappointed to read a manpage. Just yesterday I was trying to learn something on a system at work and I asked around, "where's the manpage for this?"The devs were like, "uh, we didnt bother because we didnt think anyone used manpages."I was in shock... this from guys that used to work at Redhat. @fribbledom
(DIR) Post #AMgMWl5DpJ1hHG4dI8 by herag@dobbs.town
2022-08-19T09:59:16Z
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@wolf480plI will say, it would be nice if the manpage referenced something, it would work like newsboat where you just hit the associated number and it takes you to that reference... @fribbledom
(DIR) Post #AMhjOnxfsEC6JGjh2W by mistermonster@firebird.zone
2022-08-20T01:50:17.085110Z
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@fribbledom fragmentation and continued legacy support.I like markdown. If I designed an operating system from scratch, I'd use it for all internal documentation. And someone in 50 years would be cursing me for it.
(DIR) Post #AMiNlBDg4rcyysRgHo by murks@social.tchncs.de
2022-08-19T08:33:53Z
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@fribbledom Which of the hundred variants of markdown?
(DIR) Post #AMiO1Og7o0XJM8U5ei by js@mstdn.io
2022-08-20T09:25:26Z
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@fribbledom AmigaGuide? :D
(DIR) Post #AMiO4S7HTnYit5dwiu by js@mstdn.io
2022-08-20T09:26:00Z
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@fribbledom AmigaGuide? :D