man(5BSD) (BSD System Compatibility) man(5BSD)
NAME
man - macros to format Reference Manual pages
SYNOPSIS
nroff -man filename . . .
troff -man filename . . .
DESCRIPTION
These macros are used to lay out the reference pages in this
manual. Note: if filename contains format input for a
preprocessor, the commands shown above must be piped through
the appropriate preprocessor. This is handled automatically
by man(1). See the ``Conventions'' section.
Any text argument t may be zero to six words. Quotes may be
used to include SPACE characters in a word. If text is empty,
the special treatment is applied to the next input line with
text to be printed. In this way .I may be used to italicize a
whole line, or .SB may be used to make small bold letters.
A prevailing indent distance is remembered between successive
indented paragraphs, and is reset to default value upon
reaching a non-indented paragraph. Default units for indents
i are ens.
Type font and size are reset to default values before each
paragraph, and after processing font and size setting macros.
These strings are predefined by -man:
\*R `(Reg)', trademark symbol in troff.
\*S Change to default type size.
Requests
* n.t.l. = next text line; p.i. = prevailing indent
Cause If no
Request Break Argument Explanation
_______________________________________________________________________
.B t no t=n.t.l.* Text is in bold font.
.BI t no t=n.t.l. Join words, alternating bold and italic.
.BR t no t=n.t.l. Join words, alternating bold and roman.
.DT no .5i 1i . . . Restore default tabs.
.HP i yes i=p.i.* Begin paragraph with hanging indent. Set
prevailing indent to i.
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man(5BSD) (BSD System Compatibility) man(5BSD)
Cause If no
Request Break Argument Explanation
_______________________________________________________________________
.I t no t=n.t.l. Text is italic.
.IB t no t=n.t.l. Join words, alternating italic and bold.
.IP x i yes x="" Same as .TP with tag x.
.IR t no t=n.t.l. Join words, alternating italic and roman.
.IX t no - Index macro.
.LP yes - Begin left-aligned paragraph. Set
prevailing indent to .5i.
.PD d no d=.4v Set vertical distance between paragraphs.
.PP yes - Same as .LP.
Cause If no
Request Break Argument Explanation
__________________________________________________________________________________
.RE yes - End of relative indent. Restores prevailing
indent.
.RB t no t=n.t.l. Join words, alternating roman and bold.
.RI t no t=n.t.l. Join words, alternating roman and italic.
.RS i yes i=p.i. Start relative indent, increase indent by i. Sets
prevailing indent to .5i for nested indents.
.SB t no - Reduce size of text by 1 point, make text bold.
.SH t yes - Section Heading.
.SM t no t=n.t.l. Reduce size of text by 1 point.
.SS t yes t=n.t.l. Section Subheading.
.TH n s d f m yes - Begin reference page n, of of section s; d is the
date of the most recent change. If present, f is
the left page footer; m is the main page (center)
header. Sets prevailing indent and tabs to .5i.
.TP i yes i=p.i. Begin indented paragraph, with the tag given
on the next text line. Set prevailing indent to i.
Conventions
When formatting a manual page, man examines the first line to
determine whether it requires special processing. For example
a first line consisting of:
'\" t
indicates that the manual page must be run through the
tbl(1BSD) preprocessor.
A typical manual page for a command or function is laid out as
follows:
Copyright 1994 Novell, Inc. Page 2
man(5BSD) (BSD System Compatibility) man(5BSD)
.TH title [1-8]
The name of the command or function, which serves as the
title of the manual page. This is followed by the
number of the section in which it appears.
.SH NAME
The name, or list of names, by which the command is
called, followed by a dash and then a one-line summary
of the action performed. All in roman font, this
section contains no troff(1BSD) commands or escapes, and
no macro requests. It is used to generate the
whatis(1BSD) database.
.SH SYNOPSIS
Commands:
The syntax of the command and its arguments, as
typed on the command line. When in boldface, a
word must be typed exactly as printed. When in
italics, a word can be replaced with an argument
that you supply. References to bold or italicized
items are not capitalized in other sections, even
when they begin a sentence.
Syntactic symbols appear in roman face:
[ ] An argument, when surrounded by brackets is
optional.
| Arguments separated by a vertical bar are
exclusive. You can supply only one item
from such a list.
. . . Arguments followed by an ellipsis can be
repeated. When an ellipsis follows a
bracketed set, the expression within the
brackets can be repeated.
Functions:
If required, the data declaration, or #include
directive, is shown first, followed by the
function declaration. Otherwise, the function
declaration is shown.
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man(5BSD) (BSD System Compatibility) man(5BSD)
.SH DESCRIPTION
A narrative overview of the command or function's
external behavior. This includes how it interacts with
files or data, and how it handles the standard input,
standard output and standard error. Internals and
implementation details are normally omitted. This
section attempts to provide a succinct overview in
answer to the question, ``what does it do?''
Literal text from the synopsis appears in constant
width, as do literal filenames and references to items
that appear elsewhere in the reference manuals.
Arguments are italicized.
If a command interprets either subcommands or an input
grammar, its command interface or input grammar is
normally described in a USAGE section, which follows the
OPTIONS section. The DESCRIPTION section only describes
the behavior of the command, not that of subcommands.
.SH OPTIONS
The list of options along with a description of how each
affects the command's operation.
.SH FILES
A list of files associated with the command or function.
.SH REFERENCES
A comma-separated list of related manual pages, followed
by references to other published materials.
.SH DIAGNOSTICS
A list of diagnostic messages and an explanation of
each.
.SH NOTES
A description of limitations, known defects, and
possible problems associated with the command or
function.
FILES
/usr/ucblib/doctools/tmac/an
REFERENCES
man(1), nroff(1BSD), troff(1BSD), whatis(1BSD)
Copyright 1994 Novell, Inc. Page 4