NAME

xman - Manual page display program for the X Window System. 

SYNOPSIS

xman [-options ...]

DESCRIPTION

Xman is a manual page browser.  The default size of the initial xman window is small so that you can leave it running throughout your entire login session.  In the initial window there are three options: Help will pop up a window with on-line help, Quit will exit, and Manual Page will pop up a window with a manual page browser in it.  You may pop up more than one manual page browser window from a single execution of xman. 

For further information on using xman please read the on-line help information.  The rest of this manual page will discuss customization of xman. 

Xman allows customization of both the directories to be searched for manual pages, and the name that each directory will map to in the Manual Sections menu.  Xman determines which direcories it will search by reading the MANPATH environment variable.  This enviroment is expected to be a colon seperated list of directories for xman to search. 

 setenv MANPATH /mit/kit/man:/usr/man

By default, xman will search each of the following directories (in each of the directories specified in the users MANPATH) for manual pages.  If manual pages exist in that directory then they are added to list of manual pages for the corrosponding menu item.  A menu item is only displayed for those sections that actually contain manual pages. 

 DirectorySection Name
---------------------
man1User Commands       (1)
man2System Calls        (2)
man3Subroutines         (3)
man4Devices             (4)
man5File Formats        (5)
man6Games               (6)
man7Miscellaneous       (7)
man8Sys. Administration (8)
manlLocal               (l)
mannNew                 (n)
manoOld                 (o)
 

For instance, a user has three directories in her manual path and each contain a directory called man3.  All these manual pages will appear alphabetically sorted when the user clicks on the menu item called Subroutines (3).  If there is no directory called mano in any of the directories in her MANPATH, or there are no manual pages in any of the directories called mano then no menu item will be displayed for the section called Old (o). 

By using the mandesc file a user or system manager is able to more closely control which manual pages will appear in each of the sections represented by menu items in the Manual Sections menu.  This functionality is only avaliable on a section by section basis, and individual manual pages may not be handled in this manner (Although generous use of symbolic links - ln(1) - will allow almost any configuration you can imagine).  The format of the mandesc file is a character followed by a label.  The character determines which of the sections will be added under this label.  For instance suppose that you would like to create an extra menu item that contains all programmer subroutines.  This label should contain all manual pages in both sections two and three.  The mandesc file would look like this. 

 
2Programmer Subroutines
3Programmer Subroutines
 

This will add a menu item to the Manual Sections menu that would bring up a listing of all manual pages in sections two and three of Unix Programmers Manual.  Since the label names are exactly the same they will be added to the same section. Note, however, that the original sections still exist. 

If you want to completely ignore the default sections in a manual directory the add the line:

 no default sections
 

Anywhere in your mandesc file.  This keeps xman from searching the default manual sections In that directory only.  As an example, suppose you want to do the same thing as above, but you don’t think that it is useful to have the System Calls or Subroutines sections any longer.  You would need to duplicate the default entries, as well as adding your new one. 

 no default sections
1User Commands       (1)
2Programmer Subroutines
3Programmer Subroutines
4Devices             (4)
5File Formats        (5)
6Games               (6)
7Miscellaneous       (7)
8Sys. Administration (8)
lLocal               (l)
nNew                 (n)
oOld                 (o)
 

Xman will read any section that is of the from man<character>, where <character> is an upper or lower case letter (they are treated distinctly) or a numeral (0-9).  Be warned, however, that man(1) and catman(8) will not search directories that are non-standard. 

Xman creates temporary files in /tmp for all unformatted man pages and all apropos searches. 

COMMAND LINE OPTIONS

-helpfile filename
Specifies a helpfile to use other than the default.

-bothshown
Allows both the manual page and manual directory to be on the screen at the same time.

-notopbox
Starts without the Top Menu with the three buttons in it.

-geometry WxH+X+Y
Sets the size and location of the Top Menu with the three buttons in it.

-pagesize WxH+X+Y
Sets the size and location of all the Manual Pages.

-bw pixels or -borderwidth pixels
Specifies the width of the border for all windows in xman. 

-bd color or -bordercolor color
Specifies the color of the borders of all windows in xman. 

-fg color or -foreground color
Specifies the foreground color to be used.

-bg color or -background color
Specifies the background color to be used.

-fn font or -font font
Specifies the font to use for all buttons and labels.

-display host:display[.screen]
Specifies a display other than the default specified by the DISPLAY environment variable.

-name name
Specifies the name to use when retrieving resources.

-title title
Specifies the title of this application.

-xrm resources
Allows a resource to be specified on the command line.

X DEFAULTS

 
The xman program uses the following X resources: foreground, background, width, height, borderWidth, and borderColor. 

In order to change the default values for widget resources you need to know widget names.  Below are the names of some of the most common widgets.  You can also reference Widgets by class.  The most common classes are Label, Command, and Text. 

topBox the top menu

help the help window

manualBrowser
the manual page display window

xmanCommands
manual page command popup menu

xmanSections manual page section popup menu

xmanSearch manual page search popup menu

In addition, xman has application-specific resources which allow unique xman customizations. 

manualFontNormal
The font to use for normal text in the manual pages.

manualFontBold The font to use for bold text in the manual pages. 

manualFontItalic The font to use for italic text in the manual pages. 

directoryFontNormal
The font to use for the directory text.

bothShown Either ’true’ or ’false’, specifies whether or not you want both the directory and the manual page shown at start up. 

directoryHeight The height in pixels of the directory, when the directory and the manual page are shown simultaneously. 

topCursor The cursor to use in the top box. 

helpCursor The cursor to use in the help window. 

manpageCursor The cursor to use in the manual page window. 

searchEntryCursor
The cursor to use in the search entry text widget.

helpFile Use this rather than the system default helpfile. 

topBox Either ’true’ or ’false’, determines whether the top box (containing the help, quit and manual page buttons) or a manual page is put on the screen at start-up.  The default is true. 

verticalList Either ’true’ or ’false’, determines whether the directory listing is vertically or horizontally organized.  The default is horizontal (false). 

Here are a few examples of how to string all this information together into a resource specification that can be used on the command line with the -xrm flag, or added to your .Xresource or .Xdefaults file. 

xman∗Command.foreground: Blue All command buttons will be blue. 

xman∗topBox∗foreground: Blue Everything in the top menu has a blue foreground. 

xman∗Text.border: Red All text widgets have a red border. 

xman∗Label.font: 9x15 All label buttons have a 9x15 font. 

FILES

/usr/man/∗ or those specified in the MANPATH. 
mandesc

SEE ALSO

X(1), X(8C), man(1), apropos(1), catman(8)

ENVIRONMENT

DISPLAY - the default host and display to use. 
MANPATH - the search path for manual pages.  Directories are separated by colons (e.g. /usr/man:/mit/kit/man:/foo/bar/man).

BUGS

The -fn and -font option only specify the fonts for the command button and not the text of the manpages or directories. 
Protocol error upon selecting "Remove This Manpage".
Specification of the mandesc file format is not given in the man page. 

COPYRIGHT

Copyright 1988 by Massachusetts Institute of Technology. 
See X(1) for a full statement of rights and permissions. 

AUTHORS

Chris Peterson, MIT Project Athena from the V10 version written by Barry Shein of Boston University. 

NEWS-OSRelease 3.3