xman - Manual page display program for the X Window System
xman [-options...]
xman supports all standard Toolkit command line arguments
(see X(1X)). The following additional arguments are supported.
Specifies a helpfile to use other than the
default. Allows both the manual page and manual directory
to be on the screen at the same time. Starts without the
Top Menu with the three buttons in it. Sets the size and
location of the Top Menu with the three buttons in it.
Sets the size and location of all the Manual Pages.
The xman program 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. Typing Control-S will pop up a window prompting for a
specific manual page to display. You may display more than
one manual page browser window at a time from a single
execution of xman.
For further information on using xman, please read the online
help information. Most of this manual 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 Sections menu. xman determines
which directories it will search by reading the MANPATH
environment variable. If no MANPATH is found then the
directory /usr/man is searched on POSIX systems. This
environment is expected to be a colon-separated 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 corresponding menu item. A menu item is only displayed
for those sections that actually contain manual pages.
------------------------------------------
Directory Section Name
------------------------------------------
man1 (1) User Commands
man2 (2) System Calls
man3 (3) Programming Routines
man4 (4) File Formats
man5 (5) Miscellaneous Information
man6 (6) Games
man7 (7) Special Files
man8 (8) System Administration
manl (l) Local
mann (n) New
mano (o) Old
------------------------------------------
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 selects the menu item called (3) Subroutines. 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 (o) Old.
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 Sections
menu. This functionality is only available on a
section by section basis, and individual manual pages may
not be handled in this manner. (Although generous use of
symbolic links -- see 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 Sections menu that would
bring up a listing of all manual pages in sections two and
three of the 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 then 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 do not 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 1(1) User Commands 2(2) System Calls
3(3) Programming Routines 4(4) File Formats 5(5) Miscellaneous
Information 6(6) Games 7(7) Special Files 8(8) System
Administration l(l) Local n(n) New o(o) Old
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.
In order to specify resources, it is useful to know the
hierarchy of the widgets which compose xman. In the notation
below, indentation indicates hierarchical structure.
The widget class name is given first, followed by the widget
instance name.
Xman xman (This widget is never used)
TopLevelShell topBox
Form form
Label topLabel
Command helpButton
Command quitButton
Command manpageButton
TransientShell search
DialogWidgetClass dialog
Label label
Text value
Command manualPage
Command apropos
Command cancel
TransientShell pleaseStandBy
Label label
TopLevelShell manualBrowser
Paned Manpage_Vpane
Paned horizPane
MenuButton options
MenuButton sections
Label manualBrowser
Viewport directory
List directory
List directory
.
. (one for each section,
. created on the fly)
.
ScrollByLine manualPage
SimpleMenu optionMenu
SmeBSB displayDirectory
SmeBSB displayManualPage
SmeBSB help
SmeBSB search
SmeBSB showBothScreens
SmeBSB removeThisManpage
SmeBSB openNewManpage
SmeBSB showVersion
SmeBSB quit
SimpleMenu sectionMenu
SmeBSB <name of section>
.
. (one for each section)
.
TransientShell search
DialogWidgetClass dialog
Label label
Text value
Command manualPage
Command apropos
Command cancel
TransientShell pleaseStandBy
Label label
TransientShell likeToSave
Dialog dialog
Label label
Text value
Command yes
Command no
TopLevelShell help
Paned Manpage_Vpane
Paned horizPane
MenuButton options
MenuButton sections
Label manualBrowser
ScrollByLine manualPage
SimpleMenu optionMenu
SmeBSB displayDirectory
SmeBSB displayManualPage
SmeBSB help
SmeBSB search
SmeBSB showBothScreens
SmeBSB removeThisManpage
SmeBSB openNewManpage
SmeBSB showVersion
SmeBSB quit
APPLICATION RESOURCES [Toc] [Back] xman has the following application-specific resources
which allow customizations unique to xman. The font to
use for normal text in the manual pages. The font to use
for bold text in the manual pages. The font to use for
italic text in the manual pages. The font to use for the
directory text. Either `true' or `false,' specifies
whether or not you want both the directory and the manual
page shown at start up. The height in pixels of the
directory, when the directory and the manual page are
shown simultaneously. The cursor to use in the top box.
The cursor to use in the help window. The cursor to use
in the manual page window. The cursor to use in the
search entry text widget. This is the color of all the
cursors (pointers) specified above. The name was chosen
to be compatible with xterm. Use this rather than the
system default helpfile. 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. Either `true' or
`false,' determines whether the directory listing is vertically
or horizontally organized. The default is horizontal
(false).
xman defines all user interaction through global actions.
This allows the user to modify the translation table of
any widget, and bind any event to the new user action.
The list of actions supported by xman are: When used in a
manual page display window this will allow the user to
move between a directory and manual page display. The
page argument can be either Directory or ManualPage. This
action may be used anywhere, and will exit xman. Only
useful when used in a search popup, this action will cause
the search widget to perform the named search type on the
string in the search popup's value widget. This action
will also pop down the search widget. The type argument
can be either Apropos, Manpage or Cancel. If an action of
Open is specified then xman will open a new manual page to
display the results of the search, otherwise xman will
attempt to display the results in the parent of the search
popup. This action may be used anywhere, and will popup
the help widget. This action may be used anywhere except
in a help window. It will cause the search popup to
become active and visible on the screen, allowing the user
search for a manual page. This action may be used anywhere,
and will create a new manual page display window.
This action may be used in any manual page or help display
window. When called it will remove the window, and clean
up all resources associated with it. This action can only
be used in the likeToSave popup widget, and tells xman
whether to Save or Cancel a save of the manual page that
has just been formatted. This action may be called from
any manual page or help display window, and will cause the
informational display line to show the current version of
xman.
The xman client returns the following error message if you
do not have any manpage subsets installed on your system:
Xman Error: Could not allocate memory for manual sections
the default host and display to use. the search path for
manual pages. Directories are separated by colons (for
example, /usr/man:/mit/kit/man:/foo/bar/man). to get the
name of a resource file that overrides the global
resources stored in the RESOURCE_MANAGER property. A
string that will have "Xman" appended to it. This string
will be the full path name of a user app-defaults file to
be merged into the resource database after the system appdefaults
file, and before the resources that are attached
to the display.
See X(1X) for a full statement of rights and permissions.
specifies required resources. <XRoot> refers to the root
of the X11 install tree. xman creates temporary files in
/tmp for all unformatted man pages and all apropos
searches.
X(1X), man(1), apropos(1), catman(8), Athena Widget Set
Chris Peterson, MIT X Consortium from the V10 version
written by Barry Shein formerly of Boston University.
xman(1X)
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