Re: Why I can't use `info' in emacs?

["Robert Thorpe" <rthorpe@realworldtech.com>]

Giorgos Keramidas wrote:
> On 15 Dec 2006 06:57:13 -0800,
> "Robert Thorpe" <rthorpe@realworldtech.com> wrote:
> >Hadron Quark wrote:
> >>"Robert Thorpe" <rthorpe@realworldtech.com> writes:
> >>> It's not documented by Emacs, it's documented in the Info docs that
> >>> come with GLibc.
> >>
> >> I installed the glibc info package on my ubuntu system. restarted
> >> emacs. Here are some outputs from the info pages for glibc and the man
> >> pages for printf:
> >>
> >> (a) man page using manual-entry(current-word):
> >>
> >> ,----
> >> | PRINTF(3)    Linux Programmer's Manual    <snip>
> >>
> >> Surely the man pages are superior in this instance for a programmer?
> >
> > It depends.  [...]
> > The man-page is quite thorough in this case, but it is a little
> > confusing in one respect, It says "Linux Programmer's Manual".  I
> > have no idea why it says this, since printf is provided by Glibc.
>
> That's because man pages are organized in sections.  The section title
> for manpages in section 3 is "Linux Programmer's Manual" on Linux.  On
> other systems, section 3 may have a slightly different title.  Here, for
> instance, on a FreeBSD system, the title is:
>
> PRINTF(3)             FreeBSD Library Functions Manual            PRINTF(3)

I don't agree.  Individual man pages should have titles, not just
sections of the manual.

In the old days when Unix all came from AT&T it made sense if the man
page simply announced the purpose of the section, eg "Unix Library
Function Manual".  This was, I believe the title of section 3 of the
Unix manual.

These days in free *nixes have bits coming from all over the place.
Now it makes sense if the title of the man page reflects the origin of
the command.  In section 3 of the manual I have Perl docs, libc docs
and linux docs.  There's probably some other stuff in there I haven't
mentioned.

The FreeBSD entry is entirely correct, since FreeBSD's libc is
maintained with FreeBSD.