How to add entry in Linux man page database

Question

I have a manual page for mongoose web server named as mongoose.1 as a result of doing make and make install command to install mongoose web server on my ubuntu 12.04. But ,the man page entry is not in manual page database.

output on my command line when I did : "man mongoose"

akshay@akshay-Inspiron-N5010:~/mongoose$ man mongoose
  No manual entry for mongoose
  See 'man 7 undocumented' for help when manual pages are not available.

I know the path of all man pages where they are stored is:-

/usr/local/share/man/

I am thankful for your answers in advance.

Where is the manpage installed? Is the path in `/etc/manpath.config`? — fge, Dec 25 '12 at 13:08
You should better ask this on superuser.com, stackoverflow is for programming questions. — Martin Baulig, Dec 25 '12 at 13:08

score 17 · Accepted Answer · edited May 04 '14 at 21:27

17

The directory where the manpage is installed should be listed either in /etc/manpath.config or in the MANPATH environment variable. E.g., if the manpage is

/opt/mongoose/share/man/man1/mongoose.1

then you can set it using

MANPATH=/opt/mongoose/share/man man mongoose

(or change the MANPATH in your .bashrc or similar shell startup file).

edited May 04 '14 at 21:27

Blorgbeard

101,031
48
228
272

answered Dec 25 '12 at 13:19

Fred Foo

355,277
75
744
836

My man page path is : /home/akshay/mongoose/mongoose.1 then what should I do in /etc/manpath.config file under MANPATH mapping table? also please tell how to access an environment variable to change it's value as you mentioned. Thanks. – Akshay Patil Dec 25 '12 at 13:42
2

You should install the manpage in a directory that has the same structure as `/usr/share/man`, e.g. `/home/akshay/mongoose/man/man1/mongoose.1`, then add `/home/akshay/mongoose/man` to your `MANPATH`. As for changing an environment variable, check your shell's documentation (it's probably Bash). – Fred Foo Dec 25 '12 at 13:58
To finish up, recreate the database and verify your new pages are available. `sudo mandb` – rickfoosusa Mar 07 '16 at 23:16

score 2 · Answer 2 · edited Apr 11 '20 at 06:40

2

Found a solution: We have to just copy mongoose.1 which is a man file into folder /usr/share/man/man1/

akshay@akshay-Inspiron-N5010:~/mongoose$ sudo cp mongoose.1 /usr/share/man/man1/

In /usr/share/man/ there are folders named from man1 to man8. I just guessed my man page extension of mongoose.1 is '1' so I copied that into man1 folder. Am I right on this?

After this step, man mongoose shows the manual page entry successfully.

edited Apr 11 '20 at 06:40

hspil

117
1
6

answered Dec 25 '12 at 13:55

Akshay Patil

954
1
12
28

8

You should never install anything in `/usr/share` except through the package manager. – Fred Foo Dec 25 '12 at 13:56
3

@AkshayPatil however, you can save it to `/usr/local/share/man/man1/` – Jonathan E. Landrum May 16 '17 at 13:12

How to add entry in Linux man page database

2 Answers2

Linked