Re: [9fans] Capitalization in man pages.

[jmk@plan9.bell-labs.com]

Seems to me you could satisfy both your desire for consistency
and that of being a frustrated writer by writing the man page that
details how to write a man page in the accepted Plan 9 style.

--jim

On Tue Dec  6 08:03:30 EST 2005, lyndon@orthanc.ca wrote:
> 
> On Dec 6, 2005, at 4:32 AM, Charles Forsyth wrote:
> 
> >> But most importantly, they try to ensure
> >> consistency throughout the documentation set.
> >
> > so does Plan 9; it just doesn't use your rules.
> 
> I'm curious about this comment.  man(6) describes the macros it makes  
> available, but it says nothing about how they should be used in the  
> context of writing the man page itself.  There is no mention  
> whatsoever of style or usage.  (USG derived UNIXen suffered this  
> malady as well, to varying degrees.)
> 
> So how is an author to know how to write something that is congruent  
> with the current style?  They can read existing man pages and try to  
> glean from them, but inevitably errors will creep in.  And those  
> errors will become input to the next generation of authors, and so it  
> goes.
> 
> Wasn't it Steve Johnson who did the original sweep through the UNIX  
> man pages, editing out inconsistent usage and rationalizing the  
> layout?  In the 1970s?
> 
> --lyndon
> 
> P.S.  And no, I am not in any way pissing on Rob's work!