Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!swrinde!ucsd!rutgers!cbmvax!grr
From: grr@cbmvax.commodore.com (George Robbins)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.ultrix
Subject: Re: Manpath?
Message-ID: <20081@cbmvax.commodore.com>
Date: 25 Mar 91 13:38:20 GMT
References: <1991Mar19.143738.5663@lth.se> <1991Mar20.094300.15499@lth.se> <1991Mar20.142337.4489@decuac.dec.com> <1991Mar21.114600.29641@lth.se>
Reply-To: grr@cbmvax.commodore.com (George Robbins)
Organization: Commodore, West Chester, PA
Lines: 27

In article <1991Mar21.114600.29641@lth.se> magnus@thep.lu.se (Magnus Olsson) writes:
> In article <1991Mar20.142337.4489@decuac.dec.com> avolio@decuac.DEC.COM (Frederick M. Avolio) writes:
> >The man program is very old under ULTRIX.  MANPATH was not taken
> >out.  The man program under ULTRIX is from September 1983.
> 
> Then why doesn't DEC do anything about it? As it is, it's rather inconvenient.

Of course it's inconvenient, but rememeber that Ultrix is based on BSD 4.2,
with only very selective enhancements from 4.3 BSD, SunOS and other sources.
While I'm not pleased with this position, it does explain why various
"features" of Ultrix are either outdated, or have been re-implemented in
ways that are somewhat different than what you might otherwise expect.

The man command distributed with Ultrix does support 'l' and 'n' manual
sections, on my system these are symbolic links to /usr/local/{man,cat}{l,n},
which allows me to keep local manual entries segregated from what DEC
distributes.

This sometimes requires changing installation scripts to put the man pages
in the right place, with the approprite suffix and not posting man pages for
file formats and the like, but you get used to it.  I've never seen an
install script that does what I want anyway...  8-)

-- 
George Robbins - now working for,     uucp:   {uunet|pyramid|rutgers}!cbmvax!grr
but no way officially representing:   domain: grr@cbmvax.commodore.com
Commodore, Engineering Department     phone:  215-431-9349 (only by moonlite)