Man utility: functions and installation

The man(manual ) utility is a command utility in the Unix operating system and its derivatives that gives the user access to manuals for using various commands and programs installed on the system.

What the utility can do

Man allows you to view manuals in three different sections:

• Section 1 contains manuals for general-purpose commands.
• Section 2 contains guides to system calls and kernel functions.
• Section 3 contains manuals for library functions.

To use man, you need to know the name of the command or program for which you want to get a manual. For example, to get a manual for the ls command, enter the command"man ls". The manual will be displayed in a terminal window. Man also supports keyword search and the ability to redirect output to a file or print.

How to install

man is usually already installed in most Linux and Unix distributions. If it is not installed, it can be installed using your operating system's package manager.

In Ubuntu or Debian, you can install man using the following command:

sudo apt-get install man

In CentOS or Fedora, you can install man using the following command:

sudo yum install man

Onceman is installed, you can use the"man" command in the terminal to view the manuals.