shman: bash implementation of man

Peasantoid · 2010-03-26 23:24:58

For fun and out of boredom, I created a simple implementation of the 'man' command in bash. It keeps a database of sorts, /etc/shmantab, so it doesn't have to hunt around in the filesystem for your man pages.

AUR: http://aur.archlinux.org/packages.php?ID=35958
Mercurial: http://peasantoid.org:1024/shman

Before using it, you need to run the following command:

# freshman

to create/update the database.

Also note that there is a file conflict with the 'man' executable already provided by man-db. You should rename /usr/bin/man before installing. (edit: this is no longer the case with the Arch package, but the source still contains the offending symlink because shman is entirely usable as a bare-bones man implementation.)

Typical basic usage is supported:

$ man foo
$ man 1 foo bar
$ man 1 foo 3 bar

Last edited by Peasantoid (2010-03-27 00:49:01)

Ghost1227 · 2010-03-26 23:48:58

Nifty... buy why?

Allan · 2010-03-26 23:50:02

Ghost1227 wrote:

Nifty... buy why?

Peasantoid wrote:

For fun and out of boredom

Ghost1227 · 2010-03-26 23:51:28

I got that... but it conflicts with man! Why not just make the command shman?

lolilolicon · 2010-03-26 23:54:32

Ghost1227 wrote:

I got that... but it conflicts with man! Why not just make the command shman?

Because Peasontoid is the man?

Peasantoid · 2010-03-27 00:42:26

Yeah, conflicting with man is a bad idea. I'll be removing that symlink for the time being.

** Update: now in PKGBUILD. Not removing symlink from source since it's entirely usable as a standalone man implementation, if you don't need fancy stuff like apropos.

** Coming changes: some sort of global configuration file for increased flexibility.

** Also, lolilolicon - that was a terrible joke.

Last edited by Peasantoid (2010-03-27 00:47:58)

Heller_Barde · 2010-03-27 22:38:31

Peasantoid wrote:

** Also, lolilolicon - that was a terrible joke.

of course, it was a pun Remember John Cleese's "Three rules of comedy"[1]:

John Cleese wrote:

1. No puns, 2. No puns, 3. No puns

[1] http://theavengers.tv/forever/pnote-cleese.htm

Arch Linux

#1 2010-03-26 23:24:58

shman: bash implementation of man

#2 2010-03-26 23:48:58

Re: shman: bash implementation of man

#3 2010-03-26 23:50:02

Re: shman: bash implementation of man

#4 2010-03-26 23:51:28

Re: shman: bash implementation of man

#5 2010-03-26 23:54:32

Re: shman: bash implementation of man

#6 2010-03-27 00:42:26

Re: shman: bash implementation of man

#7 2010-03-27 22:38:31

Re: shman: bash implementation of man

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