Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!auspex!guy
From: guy@auspex.auspex.com (Guy Harris)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: Stupid man pages
Message-ID: <3171@auspex.auspex.com>
Date: 13 Apr 90 18:01:49 GMT
References: <2281@ariel.unm.edu> <1831@pyrltd.UUCP> <47214@ames.arc.nasa.gov>
Organization: Auspex Systems, Santa Clara
Lines: 20

>In one of the earlier releases of the Sun OS, the man page for "find" said
>in the bugs section :
>
>	 "the syntax of this command is painful"

(Actually, I think it was just "The syntax is painful.") That one dates
back, I think, to V7; it wasn't Sun's idea (perhaps the same manager who
took out the "You can tune a file system, but you can't tune a fish"
line from TUNEFS(8) took that entry from the BUGS section out.  S/he
missed the same line in the ETHERFIND(8C) manual page ("etherfind"s
syntax is derived from that of "find").

The line I like that *was* added at Sun is from the C shell manual page:

     Although robust enough for general use, adventures into  the
     esoteric  periphery  of  the  C  shell may reveal unexpected
     quirks.

which is a polite way of saying "the C shell is often flakier than a
snowstorm"....