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MAN(7) Linux Programmer's Manual MAN(7)
NAME
man - macros to format man pages
SYNOPSIS
groff -Tascii -man file ...
groff -Tps -man file ...
man [section] title
DESCRIPTION
This manual page explains the groff an.tmac macro package (often called the man macro package). This macro package should be used by developers when writing or
porting man pages for Linux. It is fairly compatible with other versions of this macro package, so porting man pages should not be a major problem (exceptions
include the NET-2 BSD release, which uses a totally different macro package called mdoc; see mdoc(7)).
Note that NET-2 BSD mdoc man pages can be used with groff simply by specifying the -mdoc option instead of the -man option. Using the -mandoc option is, howâ
ever, recommended, since this will automatically detect which macro package is in use.
For conventions that should be employed when writing man pages for the Linux man-pages package, see man-pages(7).
Title line
The first command in a man page (after comment lines, that is, lines that start with .\") should be
.TH title section date source manual
For details of the arguments that should be supplied to the TH command, see man-pages(7).
Note that BSD mdoc-formatted pages begin with the Dd command, not the TH command.
Sections
Sections are started with .SH followed by the heading name.
The only mandatory heading is NAME, which should be the first section and be followed on the next line by a one-line description of the program:
.SH NAME
item \- description
It is extremely important that this format is followed, and that there is a backslash before the single dash which follows the item name. This syntax is used by
the mandb(8) program to create a database of short descriptions for the whatis(1) and apropos(1) commands. (See lexgrog(1) for further details on the syntax of
the NAME section.)
For a list of other sections that might appear in a manual page, see man-pages(7).
Fonts
The commands to select the type face are:
.B Bold
.BI Bold alternating with italics (especially useful for function specifications)
.BR Bold alternating with Roman (especially useful for referring to other manual pages)
.I Italics
.IB Italics alternating with bold
.IR Italics alternating with Roman
.RB Roman alternating with bold
.RI Roman alternating with italics
.SB Small alternating with bold
.SM Small (useful for acronyms)
Traditionally, each command can have up to six arguments, but the GNU implementation removes this limitation (you might still want to limit yourself to 6 arguâ
ments for portability's sake). Arguments are delimited by spaces. Double quotes can be used to specify an argument which contains spaces. For the macros that
produce alternating type faces, the arguments will be printed next to each other without intervening spaces, so that the .BR command can be used to specify a
word in bold followed by a mark of punctuation in Roman. If no arguments are given, the command is applied to the following line of text.
Other macros and strings
Below are other relevant macros and predefined strings. Unless noted otherwise, all macros cause a break (end the current line of text). Many of these macros
set or use the "prevailing indent". The "prevailing indent" value is set by any macro with the parameter i below; macros may omit i in which case the current
prevailing indent will be used. As a result, successive indented paragraphs can use the same indent without respecifying the indent value. A normal (noninâ
dented) paragraph resets the prevailing indent value to its default value (0.5 inches). By default, a given indent is measured in ens; try to use ens or ems as
units for indents, since these will automatically adjust to font size changes. The other key macro definitions are:
Normal paragraphs
.LP Same as .PP (begin a new paragraph).
.P Same as .PP (begin a new paragraph).
.PP Begin a new paragraph and reset prevailing indent.
Relative margin indent
.RS i Start relative margin indent: moves the left margin i to the right (if i is omitted, the prevailing indent value is used). A new prevailing indent is
set to 0.5 inches. As a result, all following paragraph(s) will be indented until the corresponding .RE.
.RE End relative margin indent and restores the previous value of the prevailing indent.
Indented paragraph macros
.HP i Begin paragraph with a hanging indent (the first line of the paragraph is at the left margin of normal paragraphs, and the rest of the paragraph's lines
are indented).
.IP x i Indented paragraph with optional hanging tag. If the tag x is omitted, the entire following paragraph is indented by i. If the tag x is provided, it
is hung at the left margin before the following indented paragraph (this is just like .TP except the tag is included with the command instead of being
on the following line). If the tag is too long, the text after the tag will be moved down to the next line (text will not be lost or garbled). For
bulleted lists, use this macro with \(bu (bullet) or \(em (em dash) as the tag, and for numbered lists, use the number or letter followed by a period as
the tag; this simplifies translation to other formats.
.TP i Begin paragraph with hanging tag. The tag is given on the next line, but its results are like those of the .IP command.
Hypertext link macros
.UR url
Insert a hypertext link to the URI (URL) url, with all text up to the following .UE macro as the link text.
.UE [trailer]
Terminate the link text of the preceding .UR macro, with the optional trailer (if present, usually a closing parenthesis and/or end-of-sentence punctuaâ
tion) immediately following. For non-HTML output devices (e.g., man -Tutf8), the link text is followed by the URL in angle brackets; if there is no link
text, the URL is printed as its own link text, surrounded by angle brackets. (Angle brackets may not be available on all output devices.) For the HTML
output device, the link text is hyperlinked to the URL; if there is no link text, the URL is printed as its own link text.
These macros have been supported since GNU Troff 1.20 (2009-01-05) and Heirloom Doctools Troff since 160217 (2016-02-17).
Miscellaneous macros
.DT Reset tabs to default tab values (every 0.5 inches); does not cause a break.
.PD d Set inter-paragraph vertical distance to d (if omitted, d=0.4v); does not cause a break.
.SS t Subheading t (like .SH, but used for a subsection inside a section).
Predefined strings
The man package has the following predefined strings:
\*R Registration Symbol: Âź
\*S Change to default font size
\*(Tm Trademark Symbol: âą
\*(lq Left angled double quote: â
\*(rq Right angled double quote: â
Safe subset
Although technically man is a troff macro package, in reality a large number of other tools process man page files that don't implement all of troff's abilities.
Thus, it's best to avoid some of troff's more exotic abilities where possible to permit these other tools to work correctly. Avoid using the various troff preâ
processors (if you must, go ahead and use tbl(1), but try to use the IP and TP commands instead for two-column tables). Avoid using computations; most other
tools can't process them. Use simple commands that are easy to translate to other formats. The following troff macros are believed to be safe (though in many
cases they will be ignored by translators): \", ., ad, bp, br, ce, de, ds, el, ie, if, fi, ft, hy, ig, in, na, ne, nf, nh, ps, so, sp, ti, tr.
You may also use many troff escape sequences (those sequences beginning with \). When you need to include the backslash character as normal text, use \e. Other
sequences you may use, where x or xx are any characters and N is any digit, include: \', \`, \-, \., \", \%, \*x, \*(xx, \(xx, \$N, \nx, \n(xx, \fx, and \f(xx.
Avoid using the escape sequences for drawing graphics.
Do not use the optional parameter for bp (break page). Use only positive values for sp (vertical space). Don't define a macro (de) with the same name as a
macro in this or the mdoc macro package with a different meaning; it's likely that such redefinitions will be ignored. Every positive indent (in) should be
paired with a matching negative indent (although you should be using the RS and RE macros instead). The condition test (if,ie) should only have 't' or 'n' as
the condition. Only translations (tr) that can be ignored should be used. Font changes (ft and the \f escape sequence) should only have the values 1, 2, 3, 4,
R, I, B, P, or CW (the ft command may also have no parameters).
If you use capabilities beyond these, check the results carefully on several tools. Once you've confirmed that the additional capability is safe, let the mainâ
tainer of this document know about the safe command or sequence that should be added to this list.
FILES
/usr/share/groff/[*/]tmac/an.tmac
/usr/man/whatis
NOTES
By all means include full URLs (or URIs) in the text itself; some tools such as man2html(1) can automatically turn them into hypertext links. You can also use
the UR and UE macros to identify links to related information. If you include URLs, use the full URL (e.g., âšhttp://www.kernel.orgâ©) to ensure that tools can
automatically find the URLs.
Tools processing these files should open the file and examine the first nonwhitespace character. A period (.) or single quote (') at the beginning of a line inâ
dicates a troff-based file (such as man or mdoc). A left angle bracket (<) indicates an SGML/XML-based file (such as HTML or Docbook). Anything else suggests
simple ASCII text (e.g., a "catman" result).
Many man pages begin with '\" followed by a space and a list of characters, indicating how the page is to be preprocessed. For portability's sake to non-troff
translators we recommend that you avoid using anything other than tbl(1), and Linux can detect that automatically. However, you might want to include this inâ
formation so your man page can be handled by other (less capable) systems. Here are the definitions of the preprocessors invoked by these characters:
e eqn(1)
g grap(1)
p pic(1)
r refer(1)
t tbl(1)
v vgrind(1)
BUGS
Most of the macros describe formatting (e.g., font type and spacing) instead of marking semantic content (e.g., this text is a reference to another page), comâ
pared to formats like mdoc and DocBook (even HTML has more semantic markings). This situation makes it harder to vary the man format for different media, to
make the formatting consistent for a given media, and to automatically insert cross-references. By sticking to the safe subset described above, it should be
easier to automate transitioning to a different reference page format in the future.
The Sun macro TX is not implemented.
SEE ALSO
apropos(1), groff(1), lexgrog(1), man(1), man2html(1), whatis(1), groff_man(7), groff_www(7), man-pages(7), mdoc(7)
Linux 2021-03-22 MAN(7)