The command "man" is used to display the contents of the on-line manual. There is a separate entry for each of the built-in commands. Some manual entries require more than one screen to display. When reading these longer entries, type the space bar to go on to the next screen, or type 'q' to quit reading and return to the MacShell prompt.
Manual entries are contained in resources of type 'help'. The name of the resource must be identical to the name of the entry (most often the name of a command). The manual for MacShell's built-in commands is contained in MacShell's own resource fork. Manual entries for external code resources should be in the resource fork of the file which contains the code.
MANPATH
MacShell supports a special shell variable, 'manpath' which may ease the process of reading manual entries contained in external resource files.
This variable should be set, preferably in the MacShell configuration file, to contain names of directories (folders) which contain compiled code resources with associated manual entries.
When a manual entry is invoked which is not one of the built-in entries, MacShell will search the directories specified in 'manpath' for a like-named executable file. MacShell will then attempt to locate an appropriate manual entry in the resource fork of this file.
If manpath is not set, the default manpath is the current directory (:). If manpath is set, it should normally include the current directory explicitly.
SEE ALSO
macshell (for more information about 'manpath'), set (for information about shell variables in general), rehash, which
