Does anyone actually read the "info" pages ?

brianL · 05-28-2018, 04:10 AM

Many man pages, mostly GNU stuff such as coreutils, will refer you to info pages for full information. So, yes, they are useful. RTFI as well as RTFM.

Trihexagonal · 05-28-2018, 05:25 AM

Code:

$ man info
INFO(1)                          User Commands                         INFO(1)

NAME
       info - read Info documents

SYNOPSIS
       info [OPTION]... [MENU-ITEM...]

DESCRIPTION
       Read documentation in Info format.

I didn't even know there was such a thing as info pages till I read this post.

allend · 05-28-2018, 10:21 AM

man pages provide a short summary of command usage, while info pages are for detailed explanation.
Two of my favourite examples: sed and ddrescue.

Myk267 · 05-28-2018, 12:22 PM

I almost forgot about this: there are nice texinfo versions of SICP, if you want the whole emacs+scheme environment experience.

Keith Hedger · 05-28-2018, 06:36 PM

no, man and --help usually does the trick.

RandomTroll · 05-29-2018, 02:06 AM

Sometimes, especially emacs, info pages are much better. Often they're the man pages. I dislike the info interface.

dogpatch · 06-08-2018, 04:07 PM

Many man pages tell me to try info but

Code:

man info

tells me

Code:

No manual entry for info

so i've never learned how to use info

jmccue · 06-08-2018, 05:50 PM

They annoy me to know end. But I heard GNU is or will be moving to a new kind of 'info' page type format. It is different than info but forgot the details. Hoping it is easier to use

scasey · 06-08-2018, 06:52 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by dogpatch

Many man pages tell me to try info but

Code:

man info

tells me

Code:

No manual entry for info

so i've never learned how to use info

Interesting...there is a man info on my CentOS 7 server containing:

Quote:

SYNOPSIS
info [OPTION]... [MENU-ITEM...]

DESCRIPTION
Read documentation in Info format.

Perhaps info is not installed on your computer?