4 ms·

For one, git never mentions their existence. For another, now that I've heard of them, I still don't know how to access them.

db48x 5y ago
Do you seriously not know how to access man pages?
- Timwi 5y ago
  The vast majority of people have not heard of man pages, and won't at all be excited or thrilled when you tell them about them. People want to use their computer, not learn how it works. People want to be able to accomplish simple tasks without having to absorb a textbook first.
- Aeolun 5y ago
  This, exactly, is why using unix is so hard for beginners. I vividly remember being extremely frustrated because every forum post on the topic seemed to assume you understood what they were asking you to do. Man pages can be read by opening a terminal/console window and typing in ‘man [command]’, then pressing enter. Generally you can scroll through them with up/down arrow and pgup/down. Normally the man page name is the same as the command, so I’m not sure how anyone would discover the one for gittutorial.
  - db48x 5y ago
    > Generally you can scroll through them with up/down arrow and pgup/down. Or even your scroll wheel! :D > Normally the man page name is the same as the command, so I’m not sure how anyone would discover the one for gittutorial. At the bottom of every man page there is a SEE ALSO section: SEE ALSO gittutorial(7), gittutorial-2(7), giteveryday(7), gitcvs-migration(7), gitglossary(7), gitcore-tutorial(7), gitcli(7), The Git User’s Manual[1], gitworkflows(7) This is as close to clickable links as man gets; if you want actual links you could run “info git” instead. There is also occasionally a NOTES section: NOTES 1. Git User’s Manual file:///usr/share/doc/git/user-manual.html 2. Trace2 documentation file:///usr/share/doc/git/technical/api-trace2.html 3. Git concepts chapter of the user-manual file:///usr/share/doc/git/user-manual.html#git-concepts 4. howto file:///usr/share/doc/git/howto-index.html 5. Git API documentation file:///usr/share/doc/git/technical/api-index.html It also happens to mention gittutorial(7) and giteveryday(7) in the second sentence of the description, way back at the top of the man page. These are above the fold even in an 80×24 terminal.
- recursive 5y ago
  Tell me if I'm wrong. 1. Have some unix-like operating system. 2. Type `man` at a command prompt. Is that about right? I haven't got to step 1 yet.
  - db48x 5y ago
    If you can type “git” at a command–line prompt then you should also be able to type “man” at the same prompt. But even if you cannot (for some unfathomable reason) git has you covered. You can type “git help foo” to open git’s man page for foo. So “git help tutorial” or “git help gittutorial” will both work. Man pages are something that UNIX really did right. When you bought a UNIX, it came with many volumes of printed reference materials covering every detail. Every command you could type, every C library function you could call, every syscall, was documented right there in the manual on your shelf. But they went one step further and provided the source for those manuals on the computer itself (literally, they were printed from the same troff files that the man viewer displays to you), so that you could view anything in those manuals without even taking them down off of your shelf. They’re indexed for instant retrieval and fast searches, so that there’s literally no delay when you ask for help. And they’re usually really high quality too! Sometimes they delve into jargon, or fail to spell out all of the consequences of some obscure option, but it is super rare that they leave anything out. Originally they were maintained by professional documentation writers, but these days they are lovingly maintained by volunteers who spend thousands of hours keeping them up to date. There’s a whole education’s worth of material in there, and people just don’t use them. I can only blame learned helplessness, or Windows. I bet you don’t know about Info either.
    - recursive 5y ago
      Yes, you can type "man" at a powershell prompt, but it's not an incarnation of man that knows anything about git, despite the limits of what you're able to fathom. PS C:\> git --version git version 2.32.0.windows.2 PS C:\> man git Get-Help : Get-Help could not find git in a help file in this session. To download updated help topics type: "Update-Help". To get help online, search for the help topic in the TechNet library at https:/go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=107116. I use `git help` regularly. I always pass it a git command. I didn't know there were other topics you can pass. I do know about "Info", in several contexts. Foremost, it's short for "information". But I bet that's not what you're talking about. Trying to run it yields "info : The term 'info' is not recognized as..." and so on.
b3n 5y ago
I am not sure what you mean by "never mentions their existence", they are very clearly mentioned near the top of the git man page: DESCRIPTION Git is a fast, scalable, distributed revision control system with an unusually rich command set that provides both high-level operations and full access to internals. See gittutorial(7) to get started, then see giteveryday(7) for a useful minimum set of commands. The Git User's Manual[1] has a more in-depth introduction. After you mastered the basic concepts, you can come back to this page to learn what commands Git offers. You can learn more about individual Git commands with "git help command". gitcli(7) manual page gives you an overview of the command-line command syntax.

db48x 5y ago

Do you seriously not know how to access man pages?

Timwi 5y ago
The vast majority of people have not heard of man pages, and won't at all be excited or thrilled when you tell them about them. People want to use their computer, not learn how it works. People want to be able to accomplish simple tasks without having to absorb a textbook first.
Aeolun 5y ago
This, exactly, is why using unix is so hard for beginners. I vividly remember being extremely frustrated because every forum post on the topic seemed to assume you understood what they were asking you to do. Man pages can be read by opening a terminal/console window and typing in ‘man [command]’, then pressing enter. Generally you can scroll through them with up/down arrow and pgup/down. Normally the man page name is the same as the command, so I’m not sure how anyone would discover the one for gittutorial.
- db48x 5y ago
  > Generally you can scroll through them with up/down arrow and pgup/down. Or even your scroll wheel! :D > Normally the man page name is the same as the command, so I’m not sure how anyone would discover the one for gittutorial. At the bottom of every man page there is a SEE ALSO section: SEE ALSO gittutorial(7), gittutorial-2(7), giteveryday(7), gitcvs-migration(7), gitglossary(7), gitcore-tutorial(7), gitcli(7), The Git User’s Manual[1], gitworkflows(7) This is as close to clickable links as man gets; if you want actual links you could run “info git” instead. There is also occasionally a NOTES section: NOTES 1. Git User’s Manual file:///usr/share/doc/git/user-manual.html 2. Trace2 documentation file:///usr/share/doc/git/technical/api-trace2.html 3. Git concepts chapter of the user-manual file:///usr/share/doc/git/user-manual.html#git-concepts 4. howto file:///usr/share/doc/git/howto-index.html 5. Git API documentation file:///usr/share/doc/git/technical/api-index.html It also happens to mention gittutorial(7) and giteveryday(7) in the second sentence of the description, way back at the top of the man page. These are above the fold even in an 80×24 terminal.
recursive 5y ago
Tell me if I'm wrong. 1. Have some unix-like operating system. 2. Type `man` at a command prompt. Is that about right? I haven't got to step 1 yet.
- db48x 5y ago
  If you can type “git” at a command–line prompt then you should also be able to type “man” at the same prompt. But even if you cannot (for some unfathomable reason) git has you covered. You can type “git help foo” to open git’s man page for foo. So “git help tutorial” or “git help gittutorial” will both work. Man pages are something that UNIX really did right. When you bought a UNIX, it came with many volumes of printed reference materials covering every detail. Every command you could type, every C library function you could call, every syscall, was documented right there in the manual on your shelf. But they went one step further and provided the source for those manuals on the computer itself (literally, they were printed from the same troff files that the man viewer displays to you), so that you could view anything in those manuals without even taking them down off of your shelf. They’re indexed for instant retrieval and fast searches, so that there’s literally no delay when you ask for help. And they’re usually really high quality too! Sometimes they delve into jargon, or fail to spell out all of the consequences of some obscure option, but it is super rare that they leave anything out. Originally they were maintained by professional documentation writers, but these days they are lovingly maintained by volunteers who spend thousands of hours keeping them up to date. There’s a whole education’s worth of material in there, and people just don’t use them. I can only blame learned helplessness, or Windows. I bet you don’t know about Info either.
  - recursive 5y ago
    Yes, you can type "man" at a powershell prompt, but it's not an incarnation of man that knows anything about git, despite the limits of what you're able to fathom. PS C:\> git --version git version 2.32.0.windows.2 PS C:\> man git Get-Help : Get-Help could not find git in a help file in this session. To download updated help topics type: "Update-Help". To get help online, search for the help topic in the TechNet library at https:/go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=107116. I use `git help` regularly. I always pass it a git command. I didn't know there were other topics you can pass. I do know about "Info", in several contexts. Foremost, it's short for "information". But I bet that's not what you're talking about. Trying to run it yields "info : The term 'info' is not recognized as..." and so on.

b3n 5y ago

I am not sure what you mean by "never mentions their existence", they are very clearly mentioned near the top of the git man page: DESCRIPTION Git is a fast, scalable, distributed revision control system with an unusually rich command set that provides both high-level operations and full access to internals. See gittutorial(7) to get started, then see giteveryday(7) for a useful minimum set of commands. The Git User's Manual[1] has a more in-depth introduction. After you mastered the basic concepts, you can come back to this page to learn what commands Git offers. You can learn more about individual Git commands with "git help command". gitcli(7) manual page gives you an overview of the command-line command syntax.