GNU bug report logs - #47324
Missing information in documentation

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Message #28 received at 47324 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: L A Walsh <coreutils <at> tlinx.org>
To: Glenn Golden <gdg <at> zplane.com>, Paul Eggert <eggert <at> cs.ucla.edu>
Cc: mail <at> bernhard-voelker.de, wharms <at> bfs.de, 47324 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: bug#47324: Missing information in documentation
Date: Thu, 25 Mar 2021 16:05:55 -0700

On 2021/03/25 08:36, Glenn Golden wrote:
> Perl's perldoc(1) is more or less analogous in spirit to GNU's
> approach based on info(1). The man pages contain quite a bit of
> useful info, but do not purport to be exhaustive. 
>   
=====

On 2021/03/25 08:05, Paul Eggert wrote:

> Most free-software projects treat manpages the way the Gnu 
> project does, or don't even bother with manpages.
>   

Re: perldoc analogous to info:

  Perl, by default, installs all of its perldocs as manpages.  Distro
supplied modules follow the same practice.  CPAN modules usually
have their information installed as manpages.

  Individual packages that don't follow existing standards may
not be converted. So yeah, that's analogous to .info: Gnu who does
their own thing doesn't supply full docs in manpages -- doesn't
really try.

---

Re: "most"[sic] fs projs...

Most or all of perl's base language information is installed as
manpages. As for 'most free-sw', if it is GUI based or
windows based, *nix manpages don't exist in their world.

If a project is run via the command line on *nix, the manpages are
the primary documentation -- for MOST free-sw targeting the *nix
cmdline.  Gnu is one of the worst offenders in *nix-cmdline-sw for
not following that standard.


Arguing the point w/Gnu-SW-devs who refuse to consider outside
viewpoints isn't very useful.

Cheers!

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