.\" $Id: whatis.1,v 1.2 2011/11/28 09:44:05 schwarze Exp $ .\" .\" Copyright (c) 2011 Kristaps Dzonsons .\" .\" Permission to use, copy, modify, and distribute this software for any .\" purpose with or without fee is hereby granted, provided that the above .\" copyright notice and this permission notice appear in all copies. .\" .\" THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS" AND THE AUTHOR DISCLAIMS ALL WARRANTIES .\" WITH REGARD TO THIS SOFTWARE INCLUDING ALL IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF .\" MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE AUTHOR BE LIABLE FOR .\" ANY SPECIAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES OR ANY DAMAGES .\" WHATSOEVER RESULTING FROM LOSS OF USE, DATA OR PROFITS, WHETHER IN AN .\" ACTION OF CONTRACT, NEGLIGENCE OR OTHER TORTIOUS ACTION, ARISING OUT OF .\" OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE USE OR PERFORMANCE OF THIS SOFTWARE. .\" .Dd $Mdocdate: November 28 2011 $ .Dt WHATIS 1 .Os .Sh NAME .Nm whatis .Nd search manual page databases .Sh SYNOPSIS .Nm .Op Fl M Ar manpath .Op Fl m Ar manpath .Op Fl S Ar arch .Op Fl s Ar section .Ar term... .Sh DESCRIPTION The .Nm utility searches for manuals named or described with .Ar term in manual page databases generated by .Xr mandocdb 8 . Its arguments are as follows: .Bl -tag -width Ds .It Fl M Ar manpath Use the colon-separated path instead of the default list of paths searched for .Xr mandocdb 8 databases. Invalid paths, or paths without manual databases, are ignored. .It Fl m Ar manpath Prepend the colon-separated paths to the list of paths searched for .Xr mandocdb 8 databases. Invalid paths, or paths without manual databases, are ignored. .It Fl S Ar arch Search only for a particular architecture. .It Fl s Ar cat Search only for a manual section. See .Xr man 1 for a listing of manual sections. .El .Pp By default, .Nm searches for .Xr mandocdb 8 databases in the default paths stipulated by .Xr man 1 . Results are sorted by manual title, with output formatted as .Pp .D1 title(sec) \- description .Pp Where .Qq title is the manual's title (note multiple manual names may exist for one title), .Qq sec is the manual section, and .Qq description is the manual's short description. If an architecture is specified for the manual, it is displayed as .Pp .D1 title(cat/arch) \- description .Pp Resulting manuals may be accessed as .Pp .Dl $ man \-s sec title .Pp If an architecture is specified in the output, use .Pp .Dl $ man \-s sec \-S arch title .Pp .Nm is identical to running .Xr apropos 1 as follows: .Pp .Dl $ apropos -- -i 'Nm~[[:<:]]term[[:>:]]' .Sh ENVIRONMENT .Bl -tag -width Ds .It Ev MANPATH Colon-separated paths overriding the default list of paths searched for manual databases. Invalid paths, or paths without manual databases, are ignored. Overridden by .Fl M . .El .\" .Sh FILES .Sh EXIT STATUS .Ex -std .Sh SEE ALSO .Xr apropos 1 , .Xr man 1 , .Xr mandoc 1 , .Xr mandocdb 8 .Sh AUTHORS The .Nm utility was written by .An Kristaps Dzonsons , .Mt kristaps@bsd.lv .