NAME
xman - Manual page display program for the X Window System

SYNOPSIS
xman [ -options ... ]

DESCRIPTION
Xman is a manual page browser. The default size of the ini-
tial xman window is small so that you can leave it running
throughout your entire login session. In the initial window
there are three options: Help will pop up a window with on-
line help, Quit will exit, and Manual Page will pop up a
window with a manual page browser in it. Typing Control-S
will pop up a window prompting for a specific manual page to
display. You may display more than one manual page browser
window at a time from a single execution of xman.

For further information on using xman, please read the on-
line help information. Most of this manual will discuss
customization of xman.

OPTIONS
Xman supports all standard Toolkit command line arguments
(see X(1)). The following additional arguments are sup-
ported.

-helpfile filename
Specifies a helpfile to use other than the default.

-bothshown
Allows both the manual page and manual directory to be
on the screen at the same time.

-notopbox
Starts without the Top Menu with the three buttons in
it.

-geometry WxH+X+Y
Sets the size and location of the Top Menu with the
three buttons in it.

-pagesize WxH+X+Y
Sets the size and location of all the Manual Pages.

CUSTOMIZING XMAN
Xman allows customization of both the directories to be
searched for manual pages, and the name that each directory
will map to in the Sections menu. Xman determines which
directories it will search by reading the MANPATH environ-
ment variable. If no MANPATH is found then the directory is
/usr/man is searched on POSIX systems. This environment is
expected to be a colon-separated list of directories for
xman to search.

setenv MANPATH /mit/kit/man:/usr/man

By default, xman will search each of the following direc-
tories (in each of the directories specified in the users
MANPATH) for manual pages. If manual pages exist in that
directory then they are added to list of manual pages for
the corresponding menu item. A menu item is only displayed
for those sections that actually contain manual pages.

Directory Section Name
--------- ------------
man1 (1) User Commands
man2 (2) System Calls
man3 (3) Subroutines
man4 (4) Devices
man5 (5) File Formats
man6 (6) Games
man7 (7) Miscellaneous
man8 (8) Sys. Administration
manl (l) Local
mann (n) New
mano (o) Old

For instance, a user has three directories in her manual
path and each contain a directory called man3. All these
manual pages will appear alphabetically sorted when the user
selects the menu item called (3) Subroutines. If there is
no directory called mano in any of the directories in her
MANPATH, or there are no manual pages in any of the direc-
tories called mano then no menu item will be displayed for
the section called (o) Old.

THE MANDESC FILE
By using the mandesc file a user or system manager is able
to more closely control which manual pages will appear in
each of the sections represented by menu items in the Sec-
tions menu. This functionality is only available on a sec-
tion by section basis, and individual manual pages may not
be handled in this manner. (Although generous use of sym-
bolic links - see ln(1) - will allow almost any configura-
tion you can imagine.)

The format of the mandesc file is a character followed by a
label. The character determines which of the sections will
be added under this label. For instance suppose that you
would like to create an extra menu item that contains all
programmer subroutines. This label should contain all
manual pages in both sections two and three. The mandesc
file would look like this:

2Programmer Subroutines
3Programmer Subroutines

This will add a menu item to the Sections menu that would
bring up a listing of all manual pages in sections two and
three of the Programmers Manual. Since the label names are
exactly the same they will be added to the same section.
Note, however, that the original sections still exist.

If you want to completely ignore the default sections in a
manual directory then add the line:

no default sections

anywhere in your mandesc file. This keeps xman from search-
ing the default manual sections In that directory only. As
an example, suppose you want to do the same thing as above,
but you don’t think that it is useful to have the System
Calls or Subroutines sections any longer. You would need to
duplicate the default entries, as well as adding your new
one.

no default sections
1(1) User Commands
2Programmer Subroutines
3Programmer Subroutines
4(4) Devices
5(5) File Formats
6(6) Games
7(7) Miscellaneous
8(8) Sys. Administration
l(l) Local
n(n) New
o(o) Old

Xman will read any section that is of the from
man<character>, where <character> is an upper or lower case
letter (they are treated distinctly) or a numeral (0-9). Be
warned, however, that man(1) and catman(8) will not search
directories that are non-standard.

WIDGETS
In order to specify resources, it is useful to know the
hierarchy of the widgets which compose xman. In the nota-
tion below, indentation indicates hierarchical structure.
The widget class name is given first, followed by the widget
instance name.

Xman xman (This widget is never used)
TopLevelShell topBox
Form form
Label topLabel
Command helpButton
Command quitButton
Command manpageButton
TransientShell search
DialogWidgetClass dialog
Label label
Text value
Command manualPage
Command apropos
Command cancel
TransientShell pleaseStandBy
Label label
TopLevelShell manualBrowser
Paned Manpage_Vpane
Paned horizPane
MenuButton options
MenuButton sections
Label manualBrowser
Viewport directory
List directory
List directory
.
. (one for each section,
. created on the fly)
.
ScrollByLine manualPage
SimpleMenu optionMenu
SmeBSB displayDirectory
SmeBSB displayManualPage
SmeBSB help
SmeBSB search
SmeBSB showBothScreens
SmeBSB removeThisManpage
SmeBSB openNewManpage
SmeBSB showVersion
SmeBSB quit
SimpleMenu sectionMenu
SmeBSB <name of section>
.
. (one for each section)
.
TransientShell search
DialogWidgetClass dialog
Label label
Text value
Command manualPage
Command apropos
Command cancel
TransientShell pleaseStandBy
Label label
TransientShell likeToSave
Dialog dialog
Label label
Text value
Command yes
Command no
TopLevelShell help
Paned Manpage_Vpane
Paned horizPane
MenuButton options
MenuButton sections
Label manualBrowser
ScrollByLine manualPage
SimpleMenu optionMenu
SmeBSB displayDirectory
SmeBSB displayManualPage
SmeBSB help
SmeBSB search
SmeBSB showBothScreens
SmeBSB removeThisManpage
SmeBSB openNewManpage
SmeBSB showVersion
SmeBSB quit

APPLICATION RESOURCES
xman has the following application-specific resources which
allow customizations unique to xman.

manualFontNormal (Class Font)
The font to use for normal text in the
manual pages.

manualFontBold (Class Font)
The font to use for bold text in the
manual pages.

manualFontItalic (Class Font)
The font to use for italic text in the
manual pages.

directoryFontNormal (Class Font)
The font to use for the directory text.

bothShown (Class Boolean)
Either ‘true’ or ‘false,’ specifies
whether or not you want both the directory
and the manual page shown at start up.

directoryHeight (Class DirectoryHeight)
The height in pixels of the directory,
when the directory and the manual page are
shown simultaneously.

topCursor (Class Cursor)
The cursor to use in the top box.

helpCursor (Class Cursor)
The cursor to use in the help window.

manpageCursor (Class Cursor)
The cursor to use in the manual page win-
dow.

searchEntryCursor (Class Cursor)
The cursor to use in the search entry text
widget.

pointerColor (Class Foreground)
This is the color of all the cursors
(pointers) specified above. The name was
chosen to be compatible with xterm.

helpFile (Class File)
Use this rather than the system default
helpfile.

topBox (Class Boolean)
Either ‘true’ or ‘false,’ determines
whether the top box (containing the help,
quit and manual page buttons) or a manual
page is put on the screen at start-up.
The default is true.

verticalList (Class Boolean)
Either ‘true’ or ‘false,’ determines
whether the directory listing is verti-
cally or horizontally organized. The
default is horizontal (false).

GLOBAL ACTIONS
Xman defines all user interaction through global actions.
This allows the user to modify the translation table of any
widget, and bind any event to the new user action. The list
of actions supported by xman are:

GotoPage(page) When used in a manual page display window
this will allow the user to move between a
directory and manual page display. The page
argument can be either Directory or Manual-
Page.

Quit() This action may be used anywhere, and will
exit xman.

Search(type, action)
Only useful when used in a search popup, this
action will cause the search widget to per-
form the named search type on the string in
the search popup’s value widget. This action
will also pop down the search widget. The
type argument can be either Apropos, Manpage
or Cancel. If an action of Open is specified
then xman will open a new manual page to
display the results of the search, otherwise
xman will attempt to display the results in
the parent of the search popup.

PopupHelp() This action may be used anywhere, and will
popup the help widget.

PopupSearch() This action may be used anywhere except in a
help window. It will cause the search popup
to become active and visible on the screen,
allowing the user search for a manual page.

CreateNewManpage()
This action may be used anywhere, and will
create a new manual page display window.

RemoveThisManpage()
This action may be used in any manual page or
help display window. When called it will
remove the window, and clean up all resources
associated with it.

SaveFormattedPage(action)
This action can only be used in the likeTo-
Save popup widget, and tells xman whether to
Save or Cancel a save of the manual page that
has just been formatted.

ShowVersion() This action may be called from any manual
page or help display window, and will cause
the informational display line to show the
current version of xman.

FILES
<manpath directory>/man<character>

<manpath directory>/cat<character>

<manpath directory>/mandesc

<XRoot>/lib/X11/app-defaults/Xman
specifies required resources.
<XRoot> refers to the root of the
X11 install tree.

/tmp Xman creates temporary files in
/tmp for all unformatted man pages
and all apropos searches.

SEE ALSO
X(1), man(1), apropos(1), catman(8), Athena Widget Set

ENVIRONMENT
DISPLAY the default host and display to use.

MANPATH the search path for manual pages. Direc-
tories are separated by colons (e.g.
/usr/man:/mit/kit/man:/foo/bar/man).

XENVIRONMENT to get the name of a resource file that over-
rides the global resources stored in the
RESOURCE_MANAGER property.

XAPPLRESDIR A string that will have "Xman" appended to
it. This string will be the full path name
of a user app-defaults file to be merged into
the resource database after the system app-
defaults file, and before the resources that
are attached to the display.
See X(1) for a full statement of rights and
permissions.

AUTHORS
Chris Peterson, MIT X Consortium from the V10 version writ-
ten by Barry Shein formerly of Boston University.