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Table 1 <br />UNIX man page sections <br />UNIX Manual SectionDescription <br />1Commands and utilities <br />2System calls <br />3Library routines <br />4File formats <br />5Miscellaneous facilities <br />6Games <br />7Special files <br />8System maintenance procedures <br />lLocal man pages <br />nNew man pages <br />oOld man pages <br />p? <br />Additional information may be appended to the basic section designations. For example, a man page <br />source file may have the name ?time.3C?, indicating that the man page is for a C library routine. <br />The consultant's experience on many different UNIX platforms has shown that the man <br />command will only recognize standard extensions <br />. These extensions seem to be hard-coded in the <br />man command. For example, the file extension ?1CRDSS? would be convenient for CRDSS <br />man <br />programs; however, a man page file with that extension will not be recognized by the command <br />and will not be displayed (more discussion on this follows later in this memorandum). For the most <br />part, all documentation will fall into sections 1 (commands), 3 (library routines), and 4 (file formats) <br />of the UNIX manual. It is common to refer to the man page for a program by using the notation <br />?item(section).? For example, the man page for ?time.3C? would referred to as ?time(3C).? This <br />notation is used when cross-referencing other man pages an d will be used in CRDSS documentation <br />(such as task memoranda) where appropriate. <br />The file contains a list of all of the man page descriptions on the system. It is <br />/usr/man/whatis <br />whatis <br />created using the command. The descriptions are basically the one-line ?NAME? entry from <br />apropos man -k <br />each man page. This file is searched when the command is entered (equivalent to ) <br />and allows a user to find commands that apply to a topic. <br />Figure 2 (at the end of this memorandum) shows a typical man page as viewable to the user. Figure <br />nroff <br />3 (at the end of the memorandum) shows the source file for the same man page. In general, <br />nroff <br /> commands are indicated by a period in the first column of a line (more complex formatting is <br />nroff <br />possible but it is beyond the scope of this document to describe the language in detail). <br />Developers responsible for creating man pages for the project are referred to UNIX system <br />man(5) <br />documentation and to the man page for for more information. Figures 2 and 3 illustrate the <br />correspondence between the source and compiled versions of the man page and should be used as a <br />reference for CRDSS developers who write man pages. Figures 4 and 5 (again, at the end of the <br />memorandum) illustrate man page source and compiled versions for a C routine which can be used <br />as a reference for developers who program library routines. <br />The sections of a man page that should generally be included in every man page are ?NAME? (the <br />name of the man page followed by a short description), ? SYNOPSIS? (the usage summary), <br />8 <br />A275 06.29.94 1.05-12 Malers <br />