MANPATH begins with ':'. Syntactically correct?

stf92 · 05-30-2011, 08:34 PM

Kernel 2.6.21.5, Slackware 12.0

Hi:

Code:

$ echo $MANPATH
:/usr/lib/java/man:/usr/share/texmf/man
$

Is this path syntactically correct? I ask 'cause a colon is the first character. Thanks.

bsdunix · 05-30-2011, 09:56 PM

It's not correct, initial MANPATH variable being set in /etc/profile is being clobbered. Check where MANPATH is being set and appended.

I'm running 13.37, not 12.0, I suspect it will be similar.

/etc/profile

Code:

# Set the values for some environment variables:
export MANPATH=/usr/local/man:/usr/man
---snip---
# Append any additional sh scripts found in /etc/profile.d/:
for profile_script in /etc/profile.d/*.sh ; do
  if [ -x $profile_script ]; then
    . $profile_script
  fi
done
unset profile_script

It then appends any additional MANPATH in /etc/profile.d:

jre.sh

Code:

#!/bin/sh
export MANPATH="${MANPATH}:${JAVA_HOME}/man"

tetex.sh

Code:

#!/bin/sh
MANPATH="$MANPATH:/usr/share/texmf/man"

So resulting MANPATH is:

Quote:

$ echo $MANPATH
/usr/local/man:/usr/man:/usr/lib64/java/man:/usr/share/texmf/man

stf92 · 05-31-2011, 04:40 PM

Thanks for your reply. I have the same settings in those three files, except that I commented out the line in /etc/profile. The reason is this: in /usr/lib/man.conf I have

Code:

# Every automatically generated MANPATH includes these fields
#
MANPATH /usr/man
MANPATH /usr/share/man
MANPATH /usr/local/man
MANPATH /usr/local/share/man
MANPATH /usr/X11R6/man
#

If I leave the line in /etc/profile uncommented, then I lose these five paths, in accordance with man's man. And with it commented out, here's what happens:

Code:

bash-3.1$ echo $MANPATH
:/usr/lib/java/man:/usr/share/texmf/man
bash-3.1$ man -w
/usr/local/share/man:/usr/share/man:/usr/man:/usr/lib/java/man:/usr/share/texmf/man:/usr/local/man:/usr/X11R6/man
bash-3.1$

which satisfactory for me, but seems to contradict the manual. That is, when seeing MANPATH set and not empty, man shouldn't read /usr/lib/man.conf.

Anyways, your post puts it clearly, and that's good enough for me. Thanks again.