CATMAN(8)                                                            CATMAN(8)



NAME
       catman - create the cat files for the manual

SYNOPSIS
       /etc/catman [ -p ] [ -n ] [ -w ] [ -M _p_a_t_h ] [ sections ]

DESCRIPTION
       _C_a_t_m_a_n creates the preformatted versions of the on-line manual from the
       nroff input files.  Each manual page is examined and those  whose  pre‐
       formatted  versions  are  missing or out of date are recreated.  If any
       changes are made, _c_a_t_m_a_n will recreate the whatis database.

       If there is one parameter not starting with a ‘-’, it is taken to be  a
       list of manual sections to look in.  For example

              catman 123

       will  cause the updating to only happen to manual sections 1, 2, and 3.

       Options:

       -n     prevents creations of the whatis database.

       -p     prints what would be done instead of doing it.

       -w     causes only the whatis database to be created.  No manual refor‐
              matting is done.

       -M     updates manual pages located in the set of directories specified
              by _p_a_t_h (/usr/man by default).  _P_a_t_h has the  form  of  a  colon
              (‘:’)   separated   list   of   directory   names,  for  example
              ‘/usr/local/man:/usr/man’.  If the  environment  variable  ‘MAN‐
              PATH’ is set, its value is used for the default path.

       If  the  nroff  source  file  contains  only  a  line  of the form ‘.so
       manx/yyy.x’, a symbolic link is made  in  the  catx  directory  to  the
       appropriate preformatted manual page.  This feature allows easy distri‐
       bution of the preformatted manual pages among  a  group  of  associated
       machines  with  _r_d_i_s_t_(_1_)_.  The nroff sources need not be distributed to
       all machines, thus saving the associated disk space.   As  an  example,
       consider  a  local network with 5 machines, called mach1 through mach5.
       Suppose mach3 has the manual page nroff sources.   Every  night,  mach3
       runs _c_a_t_m_a_n via _c_r_o_n_(_8_) and later runs _r_d_i_s_t with a distfile that looks
       like:


              MANSLAVES = ( mach1 mach2 mach4 mach5 )

              MANUALS = (/usr/man/cat[1-8no] /usr/man/whatis)

              ${MANUALS} -> ${MANSLAVES}
                      install -R;
                      notify root;


FILES
       /usr/man              default manual directory location
       /usr/man/man?/*.*     raw (nroff input) manual sections
       /usr/man/cat?/*.*     preformatted manual pages
       /usr/man/whatis       whatis database
       /usr/lib/makewhatis   command script to make whatis database

SEE ALSO
       man(1), cron(8), rdist(1)

BUGS
       Acts oddly on nights with full moons.



4th Berkeley Distribution        May 28, 1986                        CATMAN(8)