Re: Something is buggy - was [Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)]

[Andrei POPESCU]

On Ma, 02 iun 20, 10:48:45, Richard Owlett wrote:
> 
> My problem with dman revolves around running Stretch and debian.org
> defaulting to serving up information about "stable" {i.e. Buster}.

https://bugs.debian.org/cgi-bin/bugreport.cgi?bug=931992

Kind regards,
Andrei
-- 
http://wiki.debian.org/FAQsFromDebianUser


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Re: Something is buggy - was [Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)]

[Richard Owlett]

On 06/02/2020 08:45 AM, The Wanderer wrote:

On 2020-06-02 at 09:05, Richard Owlett wrote:


On 06/01/2020 05:02 PM, Richard Owlett wrote:


On 06/01/2020 04:02 PM, Ralph Katz wrote:



apt show debian-goodies
...
debman - Easily view man pages from a binary .deb without extracting
 [man, apt* (via debget)]

So...  ~$ dman packagename   # will fetch the manpages as though they
were local.

Regards,
Ralph



Thank you. Looks interesting.
1st didn't work even after installing debian-goodies.
Suspect operator. Leaving now. will pursue in morning.



Copy and paste this morning from MATE terminal

richard@defaultinstall:~$ dman gforth
bash: dman: command not found
richard@defaultinstall:~$ debman gforth
Usage: debman [options] [-- man(1) options]  ...

Options should be exactly one of:
 -f package.deb  read pages from package.deb archive
 -p package  download .deb for package and read pages
 from there
richard@defaultinstall:~$ debman -p gforth
Usage: debman [options] [-- man(1) options]  ...

Options should be exactly one of:
 -f package.deb  read pages from package.deb archive
 -p package  download .deb for package and read pages
 from there
richard@defaultinstall:~$ debman -f gforth.deb
Usage: debman [options] [-- man(1) options]  ...

Options should be exactly one of:
 -f package.deb  read pages from package.deb archive
 -p package  download .deb for package and read pages
 from there
richard@defaultinstall:~$


I have verified that both
https://manpages.debian.org/stretch/gforth/gforth.1.en.html
and
https://manpages.debian.org/buster/gforth/gforth.1.en.html

Help please.


I've dug into this, and while I thought at first there was a bug here
myself, I've figured it out.

The command lines you're giving are specifying the package name, but not
the name of the man page. The "" argument at the end of
the usage section is not optional.

For example,

$ debman -p gforth vmgen

works fine for me.


For what I was trying to do, I should have written
  debman -p gforth gforth
instead of
  debman -p gforth

My problem with dman revolves around running Stretch and debian.org 
defaulting to serving up information about "stable" {i.e. Buster}.


My bandwidth constraints cause me to purchase DVD sets to upgrade. And 
this time I had to purchase a flash drive instead instead of physical 
DVDs. The intended target machine cannot boot from a flash drive so I 
got delayed by housekeeping chores.


More later.
Thank you.



If you need to find out the name of the actual man page (since, e.g., it
isn't intuitively obvious that gforth will contain a man page for the
name 'vmgen'), something like

$ apt-file show gforth | grep /man/

ought to do it; just drop the leading path (up through the final '/')
and the trailing ".X.gz" (where X is a number) from each filename, and
it should be a valid man-page argument to debman.

(I'm not sure what it will do if there's a package which installs two
man pages with the same name but different sections, because I haven't
yet found any examples of packages which do that.)

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[David Wright]

On Tue 02 Jun 2020 at 06:13:00 (-0500), Richard Owlett wrote:
> On 05/30/2020 04:05 PM, David Wright wrote:
> > On Sat 30 May 2020 at 10:08:41 (-0500), Richard Owlett wrote:
> > > On 05/30/2020 09:50 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:
> > > > On Sat, May 30, 2020 at 04:13:22PM +0200, l0f...@tuta.io wrote:
> > > > 
> > > > [...]
> > > > 
> > > > > I would suggest the following instead:
> > > > 
> > > > [download + unpack]
> > > > 
> > > > > Of course, the method indicated by Tomas is great and may be easier 
> > > > > than mine (+ doesn't leave Debian package files on your computer).
> > > > 
> > > > I don't think "my" method is easier. Personally, I'd go with yours
> > > > any time (I dislike browsers) -- but I had the impression (wrongly?)
> > > > that the OP wanted a "webby" solution. But thanks for chiming in
> > > > with alternatives!
> > > > 
> > > 
> > > Yes. A "webby" solution can have two benefits in my environment:
> > >a. may minimize download downloaded byte count.
> > >b. following intervening links and cross references can lead to
> > >   answering important un-asked questions.
> > 
> > For man pages, I type   man foo   into google. That usually throws
> > up one or two links from different sources.
> > [snip]
> 
> You missed my point entirely. I have accessed the man page via
> https://manpages.debian.org/ . It lacks information *CRITICAL* to
> whether or not to install the package. It skirts the issue by
> referring to a file which will exist, *if and only if*, the package
> has already been installed. I.E. classical infinite loop ;}

My References header includes two of you posts. The first says

"NOTE BENE This post is about man pages as a class"

and the second says

"A "webby" solution can have two benefits in my environment"

as seen above. I ignored your little complaint about a specific man
page; instead, I addressed the Debian man pages in the subject line,
and particularly when the name of the command or package is hazy.

Thanks to Andrei for the list of references.

Cheers,
David.

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Brian]

On Tue 02 Jun 2020 at 06:13:00 -0500, Richard Owlett wrote:

> On 05/30/2020 04:05 PM, David Wright wrote:
> > On Sat 30 May 2020 at 10:08:41 (-0500), Richard Owlett wrote:
> > > On 05/30/2020 09:50 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:
> > > > On Sat, May 30, 2020 at 04:13:22PM +0200, l0f...@tuta.io wrote:
> > > > 
> > > > [...]
> > > > 
> > > > > I would suggest the following instead:
> > > > 
> > > > [download + unpack]
> > > > 
> > > > > Of course, the method indicated by Tomas is great and may be easier 
> > > > > than mine (+ doesn't leave Debian package files on your computer).
> > > > 
> > > > I don't think "my" method is easier. Personally, I'd go with yours
> > > > any time (I dislike browsers) -- but I had the impression (wrongly?)
> > > > that the OP wanted a "webby" solution. But thanks for chiming in
> > > > with alternatives!
> > > > 
> > > 
> > > Yes. A "webby" solution can have two benefits in my environment:
> > >a. may minimize download downloaded byte count.
> > >b. following intervening links and cross references can lead to
> > >   answering important un-asked questions.
> > 
> > For man pages, I type   man foo   into google. That usually throws
> > up one or two links from different sources.
> > [snip]
> 
> You missed my point entirely. I have accessed the man page via
> https://manpages.debian.org/ . It lacks information *CRITICAL* to whether or
> not to install the package. It skirts the issue by referring to a file which
> will exist, *if and only if*, the package has already been installed. I.E.
> classical infinite loop ;}

'apt download ' has been mentioned a few times. The package
may be opened and the contents of /usr/share/doc/ viewed.
This takes all of two minutes. Is there something lacking in this
technique? Too simple and straightforward, perhaps?

-- 
Brian

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Joe Pfeiffer]

Richard Owlett  writes:

> I the recent thread about returning a Debian installation to its
> original state "popularity-contest" was mentioned.
>
> I wished to compare it to other tools mentioned in that thread.
> Obvious stating point -- read the man page.
> As I never installed its package I went to
> https://manpages.debian.org/buster/popularity-contest/popularity-contest.8.en.html
> .
>
> It did not explicitly answer my question.
> However, under "SEE ALSO" it stated:
>> Additional documentation is in /usr/share/doc/popularity-contest/.
>
> *PROBLEM*
> As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT* exist.
>
> Where to find required documentation on the web?
>
> NOTE BENE
> This post is about man pages as a class.

Asking for a man page to include all of the documentation about a
package isn't reasonable -- there are man pages like that (bash comes to
mind), and it isn't a page, it's a book.  A man page tries to be a
succinct summary, so someone can look up details about running a program,
or about a file format, in a hurry.

If you want the full documentation on something you haven't installed,
the man page is the wrong place to look.  Googling 'debian
popularity-contest' (instead of looking specifically for the man page)
points me to
https://salsa.debian.org/popularity-contest-team/popularity-contest#:~:text=The%20popularity%2Dcontest%20package%20sets,go%20on%20the%20first%20CD.
which has a wealth of information.

Re: Something is buggy - was [Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)]

[l0f4r0]

Hi,

2 juin 2020 à 15:05 de rowl...@cloud85.net:

> On 06/01/2020 05:02 PM, Richard Owlett wrote:
>
> I am running Debian 9.8 with MATE desktop
>
> Synaptic reports:
>
>> Commit Log for Mon Jun  1 16:45:47 2020
>> Installed the following packages:
>> curl (7.52.1-5+deb9u9)
>> dctrl-tools (2.24-2+b1)
>> debian-goodies (0.69.1)
>> libcurl3 (7.52.1-5+deb9u9)
>>
>
> Copy and paste this morning from MATE terminal
>
>> richard@defaultinstall:~$ dman gforth
>> bash: dman: command not found
>> richard@defaultinstall:~$ debman gforth
>> Usage: debman [options] [-- man(1) options]  ...
>>
>> Options should be exactly one of:
>> -f package.deb  read pages from package.deb archive
>> -p package  download .deb for package and read pages
>> from there
>> richard@defaultinstall:~$ debman -p gforth
>> Usage: debman [options] [-- man(1) options]  ...
>>
>> Options should be exactly one of:
>> -f package.deb  read pages from package.deb archive
>> -p package  download .deb for package and read pages
>> from there
>> richard@defaultinstall:~$ debman -f gforth.deb
>> Usage: debman [options] [-- man(1) options]  ...
>>
>> Options should be exactly one of:
>> -f package.deb  read pages from package.deb archive
>> -p package  download .deb for package and read pages
>> from there
>>
> richard@defaultinstall:~$ 
> I have verified that both
> https://manpages.debian.org/stretch/gforth/gforth.1.en.html
> and
> https://manpages.debian.org/buster/gforth/gforth.1.en.html
>
Surely you did that but you haven't read previous answers on this mailing-list 
though otherwise you would not have said it is "buggy"...

Regarding dman it seems normal since your debian-goodies version is really old 
(0.69.1).
Indeed, dman seems to have been included from debian-goodies v0.70:

debian-goodies (0.70) experimental; urgency=low

  [ Antoine Beaupré ]
  * Add dman script from Ubuntu, modified to fetch pages directly from
    manpages.debian.org, see https://github.com/Debian/debiman/issues/57
    (Closes: #860920)

  [ Axel Beckert ]
  * Fix missing close statement in checkrestart. (c.f. #84)
    Thanks Emilio Pozuelo Monfort!
  * Suggest lsb-release for new dman command.

-- Axel Beckert   Sat, 22 Apr 2017 01:22:31 +0200

Best regards,
l0f4r0

Re: Something is buggy - was [Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)]

[The Wanderer]

On 2020-06-02 at 09:05, Richard Owlett wrote:

> On 06/01/2020 05:02 PM, Richard Owlett wrote:
>
>> On 06/01/2020 04:02 PM, Ralph Katz wrote:

>>> apt show debian-goodies
>>> ...
>>> debman - Easily view man pages from a binary .deb without extracting
>>> [man, apt* (via debget)]
>>>
>>> So...  ~$ dman packagename   # will fetch the manpages as though they
>>> were local.
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>> Ralph
>> 
>> 
>> Thank you. Looks interesting.
>> 1st didn't work even after installing debian-goodies.
>> Suspect operator. Leaving now. will pursue in morning.

> Copy and paste this morning from MATE terminal
>> richard@defaultinstall:~$ dman gforth
>> bash: dman: command not found
>> richard@defaultinstall:~$ debman gforth
>> Usage: debman [options] [-- man(1) options]  ...
>> 
>> Options should be exactly one of:
>> -f package.deb  read pages from package.deb archive
>> -p package  download .deb for package and read pages
>> from there
>> richard@defaultinstall:~$ debman -p gforth
>> Usage: debman [options] [-- man(1) options]  ...
>> 
>> Options should be exactly one of:
>> -f package.deb  read pages from package.deb archive
>> -p package  download .deb for package and read pages
>> from there
>> richard@defaultinstall:~$ debman -f gforth.deb
>> Usage: debman [options] [-- man(1) options]  ...
>> 
>> Options should be exactly one of:
>> -f package.deb  read pages from package.deb archive
>> -p package  download .deb for package and read pages
>> from there
>> richard@defaultinstall:~$ 
> 
> I have verified that both
> https://manpages.debian.org/stretch/gforth/gforth.1.en.html
>and
> https://manpages.debian.org/buster/gforth/gforth.1.en.html
> 
> Help please.

I've dug into this, and while I thought at first there was a bug here
myself, I've figured it out.

The command lines you're giving are specifying the package name, but not
the name of the man page. The "" argument at the end of
the usage section is not optional.

For example,

$ debman -p gforth vmgen

works fine for me.

If you need to find out the name of the actual man page (since, e.g., it
isn't intuitively obvious that gforth will contain a man page for the
name 'vmgen'), something like

$ apt-file show gforth | grep /man/

ought to do it; just drop the leading path (up through the final '/')
and the trailing ".X.gz" (where X is a number) from each filename, and
it should be a valid man-page argument to debman.

(I'm not sure what it will do if there's a package which installs two
man pages with the same name but different sections, because I haven't
yet found any examples of packages which do that.)

-- 
   The Wanderer

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one
persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all
progress depends on the unreasonable man. -- George Bernard Shaw



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Something is buggy - was [Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)]

[Richard Owlett]

On 06/01/2020 05:02 PM, Richard Owlett wrote:

On 06/01/2020 04:02 PM, Ralph Katz wrote:

On 5/30/20 3:52 AM, Richard Owlett wrote:
...

*PROBLEM*
As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT* exist.

Where to find required documentation on the web?

NOTE BENE
This post is about man pages as a class.



apt show debian-goodies
...
debman - Easily view man pages from a binary .deb without extracting
    [man, apt* (via debget)]

So...  ~$ dman packagename   # will fetch the manpages as though they
were local.

Regards,
Ralph



Thank you. Looks interesting.
1st didn't work even after installing debian-goodies.
Suspect operator. Leaving now. will pursue in morning.


I am running Debian 9.8 with MATE desktop

Synaptic reports:

Commit Log for Mon Jun  1 16:45:47 2020
Installed the following packages:
curl (7.52.1-5+deb9u9)
dctrl-tools (2.24-2+b1)
debian-goodies (0.69.1)
libcurl3 (7.52.1-5+deb9u9)



Copy and paste this morning from MATE terminal

richard@defaultinstall:~$ dman gforth
bash: dman: command not found
richard@defaultinstall:~$ debman gforth
Usage: debman [options] [-- man(1) options]  ...

Options should be exactly one of:
-f package.deb  read pages from package.deb archive
-p package  download .deb for package and read pages
from there
richard@defaultinstall:~$ debman -p gforth
Usage: debman [options] [-- man(1) options]  ...

Options should be exactly one of:
-f package.deb  read pages from package.deb archive
-p package  download .deb for package and read pages
from there
richard@defaultinstall:~$ debman -f gforth.deb
Usage: debman [options] [-- man(1) options]  ...

Options should be exactly one of:
-f package.deb  read pages from package.deb archive
-p package  download .deb for package and read pages
from there
richard@defaultinstall:~$ 


I have verified that both
https://manpages.debian.org/stretch/gforth/gforth.1.en.html
  and
https://manpages.debian.org/buster/gforth/gforth.1.en.html

Help please.
TIA

Re: [CLARIFICATION] Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Dan Ritter]

Richard Owlett wrote: 
> In a recent post a particular package was mentioned.
> I was not familiar with it.
> I went to appropriate URL under https://manpages.debian.org/buster .
> 
> It did not explicitly answer my question.
> However, under "SEE ALSO" it stated that additional documentation would be
> under /usr/share/doc/...  .
> 
> *PROBLEM*
> As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT* exist.

*ANSWER*

Option 1: Install the package. Now the docs are in
/usr/share/doc/PACKAGENAME

Option 2: Get the package (apt install -d will work, or acquire
it from the package web page) and uncompress it with ar in a
location of your choosing; then read the docs.

There may be other options, but each of these will work.

-dsr-

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Richard Owlett]

On 05/30/2020 04:05 PM, David Wright wrote:

On Sat 30 May 2020 at 10:08:41 (-0500), Richard Owlett wrote:

On 05/30/2020 09:50 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:

On Sat, May 30, 2020 at 04:13:22PM +0200, l0f...@tuta.io wrote:

[...]


I would suggest the following instead:


[download + unpack]


Of course, the method indicated by Tomas is great and may be easier than mine 
(+ doesn't leave Debian package files on your computer).


I don't think "my" method is easier. Personally, I'd go with yours
any time (I dislike browsers) -- but I had the impression (wrongly?)
that the OP wanted a "webby" solution. But thanks for chiming in
with alternatives!



Yes. A "webby" solution can have two benefits in my environment:
   a. may minimize download downloaded byte count.
   b. following intervening links and cross references can lead to
  answering important un-asked questions.


For man pages, I type   man foo   into google. That usually throws
up one or two links from different sources.
[snip]


You missed my point entirely. I have accessed the man page via 
https://manpages.debian.org/ . It lacks information *CRITICAL* to 
whether or not to install the package. It skirts the issue by referring 
to a file which will exist, *if and only if*, the package has already 
been installed. I.E. classical infinite loop ;}

[CLARIFICATION] Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Richard Owlett]

In a recent post a particular package was mentioned.
I was not familiar with it.
I went to appropriate URL under https://manpages.debian.org/buster .

It did not explicitly answer my question.
However, under "SEE ALSO" it stated that additional documentation would 
be under /usr/share/doc/...  .


*PROBLEM*
As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT* exist.

Where to find referenced documentation on the web?

NOTE BENE
This post is about man pages as a class.

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[l0f4r0]

Hi,

2 juin 2020 à 00:02 de rowl...@cloud85.net:

> On 06/01/2020 04:02 PM, Ralph Katz wrote:
>
>> apt show debian-goodies
>> ...
>> debman - Easily view man pages from a binary .deb without extracting
>>  [man, apt* (via debget)]
>>
>> So...  ~$ dman packagename   # will fetch the manpages as though they
>> were local.
>>
>> Regards,
>> Ralph
>>
> Thank you. Looks interesting.
> 1st didn't work even after installing debian-goodies.
> Suspect operator. Leaving now. will pursue in morning.
>
Are you speaking of debman? If so I suspect you forgot the last part with the 
command you want its manpages.
In short, you have multiple possibilities:

dman cmd
debman -f local_package.deb cmd
debman -p package cmd
debmany package|local_package.deb

Best regards,
l0f4r0

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Bob Weber]

On 6/1/20 6:02 PM, Richard Owlett wrote:

On 06/01/2020 04:02 PM, Ralph Katz wrote:

On 5/30/20 3:52 AM, Richard Owlett wrote:
...

*PROBLEM*
As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT* exist.

Where to find required documentation on the web?

NOTE BENE
This post is about man pages as a class.



apt show debian-goodies
...
debman - Easily view man pages from a binary .deb without extracting
    [man, apt* (via debget)]

So...  ~$ dman packagename   # will fetch the manpages as though they
were local.

Regards,
Ralph



Thank you. Looks interesting.
1st didn't work even after installing debian-goodies.
Suspect operator. Leaving now. will pursue in morning



Try the online manuals at https://manpages.debian.org/ 
 .



--


*...Bob*

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Richard Owlett]

On 06/01/2020 04:02 PM, Ralph Katz wrote:

On 5/30/20 3:52 AM, Richard Owlett wrote:
...

*PROBLEM*
As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT* exist.

Where to find required documentation on the web?

NOTE BENE
This post is about man pages as a class.



apt show debian-goodies
...
debman - Easily view man pages from a binary .deb without extracting
[man, apt* (via debget)]

So...  ~$ dman packagename   # will fetch the manpages as though they
were local.

Regards,
Ralph



Thank you. Looks interesting.
1st didn't work even after installing debian-goodies.
Suspect operator. Leaving now. will pursue in morning.

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Ralph Katz]

On 5/30/20 3:52 AM, Richard Owlett wrote:
...
> *PROBLEM*
> As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT* exist.
> 
> Where to find required documentation on the web?
> 
> NOTE BENE
> This post is about man pages as a class.
> 

apt show debian-goodies
...
debman - Easily view man pages from a binary .deb without extracting
   [man, apt* (via debget)]

So...  ~$ dman packagename   # will fetch the manpages as though they
were local.

Regards,
Ralph

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Andrei POPESCU]

On Sb, 30 mai 20, 16:05:54, David Wright wrote:
> 
> For man pages, I type   man foo   into google. That usually throws
> up one or two links from different sources.

I have/had these configured as search engines in Firefox (Vimium):

dpkg: https://packages.debian.org/search?keywords=%s
(Understands binary package names only)

bts: https://bugs.debian.org/%s
(Understands binary package names, source package names with 
src:, and bug numbers)

pts: https://packages.qa.debian.org/%s
dpt: https://tracker.debian.org/%s
(These will show source packages only, but can search by binary or 
source package names. The PTS has been superseded by Tracker)

man: https://manpages.debian.org/%s
(Understands man pages only)
 
> If there were any chance I'd use the package, I'd download it via
> apt, to get it cached, and known to apt. But that requires root.

'apt download ' works also without root privileges because it 
downloads to the current directory (not APT's cache).

Kind regards,
Andrei
-- 
http://wiki.debian.org/FAQsFromDebianUser


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Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Darac Marjal]

On 30/05/2020 10:52, Richard Owlett wrote:
> I the recent thread about returning a Debian installation to its
> original state "popularity-contest" was mentioned.
>
> I wished to compare it to other tools mentioned in that thread.
> Obvious stating point -- read the man page.
> As I never installed its package I went to
> https://manpages.debian.org/buster/popularity-contest/popularity-contest.8.en.html
> .
>
> It did not explicitly answer my question.
> However, under "SEE ALSO" it stated:
>> Additional documentation is in /usr/share/doc/popularity-contest/.
>
> *PROBLEM*
> As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT* exist.
>
> Where to find required documentation on the web?

The source code for Debian packages is available, without dowloading the
deb, at https://sources.debian.org/. For `popularity-contest`, in
particular, you can find the source code at
https://sources.debian.org/src/popularity-contest/1.70/

But how do we map from the source code to documentation installed on a
system? Well, the main file which controls how to make a deb from a
source directory is in the file "debian/rules" (Note for history: saying
that "Something Rules" was a fashionable way of expressing that that
thing was worthy of public approval due to being popular, interesting or
in any other way extraordinary). So, if you look at
https://sources.debian.org/src/popularity-contest/1.70/debian/rules/ you
should see a command invokation of "dh_installdocs README FAQ". This
tells dh (debhelper) to install the mentioned files as documentation.

Therefore, the answer to your question is:

    https://sources.debian.org/src/popularity-contest/1.70/README

    https://sources.debian.org/src/popularity-contest/1.70/FAQ

And, hopefully, you can see how to find the documentation for other
packages, too.


>
> NOTE BENE
> This post is about man pages as a class.
>
>
>



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Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[David Wright]

On Sat 30 May 2020 at 10:08:41 (-0500), Richard Owlett wrote:
> On 05/30/2020 09:50 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:
> > On Sat, May 30, 2020 at 04:13:22PM +0200, l0f...@tuta.io wrote:
> > 
> > [...]
> > 
> > > I would suggest the following instead:
> > 
> > [download + unpack]
> > 
> > > Of course, the method indicated by Tomas is great and may be easier than 
> > > mine (+ doesn't leave Debian package files on your computer).
> > 
> > I don't think "my" method is easier. Personally, I'd go with yours
> > any time (I dislike browsers) -- but I had the impression (wrongly?)
> > that the OP wanted a "webby" solution. But thanks for chiming in
> > with alternatives!
> > 
> 
> Yes. A "webby" solution can have two benefits in my environment:
>   a. may minimize download downloaded byte count.
>   b. following intervening links and cross references can lead to
>  answering important un-asked questions.

For man pages, I type   man foo   into google. That usually throws
up one or two links from different sources.

For this specific package, where I don't know the foo to type,
I googled   debian popularity contest   which got me plenty of
hits, including a load of graphs that it can produce, its
(section 8) man page, the wiki (which has a reference to the FAQ),
and the Debian packages page for popularity-contest.

The last of these (which is obviously already in my FF bookmarks)
gives you links to the package's download page, and you can download
it with that link from different mirrors. I usually paste the address
into wget, if it works (which preserves the metadata), but you
can just click it instead.

Then, as mentioned already, just press Return on the .deb file in
Midnight Commander to look at any files in the package.

I thought most people knew how to use the web like this, for
documentation on anything and (almost) everything.

If there were any chance I'd use the package, I'd download it via
apt, to get it cached, and known to apt. But that requires root.

I hope none of this violates your policy (or, as I would put it,
disagrees with your preferences).

Cheers,
David.

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Richard Owlett]

On 05/30/2020 09:50 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:

On Sat, May 30, 2020 at 04:13:22PM +0200, l0f...@tuta.io wrote:

[...]


I would suggest the following instead:


[download + unpack]


Of course, the method indicated by Tomas is great and may be easier than mine 
(+ doesn't leave Debian package files on your computer).


I don't think "my" method is easier. Personally, I'd go with yours
any time (I dislike browsers) -- but I had the impression (wrongly?)
that the OP wanted a "webby" solution. But thanks for chiming in
with alternatives!



Yes. A "webby" solution can have two benefits in my environment:
  a. may minimize download downloaded byte count.
  b. following intervening links and cross references can lead to
 answering important un-asked questions.

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[tomas]

On Sat, May 30, 2020 at 04:13:22PM +0200, l0f...@tuta.io wrote:

[...]

> I would suggest the following instead:

[download + unpack]

> Of course, the method indicated by Tomas is great and may be easier than mine 
> (+ doesn't leave Debian package files on your computer).

I don't think "my" method is easier. Personally, I'd go with yours
any time (I dislike browsers) -- but I had the impression (wrongly?)
that the OP wanted a "webby" solution. But thanks for chiming in
with alternatives!

Cheers
-- t


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Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Andrei POPESCU]

On Sb, 30 mai 20, 04:52:47, Richard Owlett wrote:
> 
> *PROBLEM*
> As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT* exist.

Midnight Commander (and probably other file managers as well) can browse 
downloaded .deb files.

apt download popularity-contest
mc (browse the CONTENTS directory)

Hope this helps,
Andrei
-- 
http://wiki.debian.org/FAQsFromDebianUser


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Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[The Wanderer]

On 2020-05-30 at 09:45, Richard Owlett wrote:

> On 05/30/2020 06:14 AM, Peter Hillier-Brook wrote:
> 
>> On 30/05/2020 10:52, Richard Owlett wrote:

>>> *PROBLEM* As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT*
>>> exist.
>>> 
>>> Where to find required documentation on the web?
>>> 
>>> NOTE BENE This post is about man pages as a class.
>> 
>> `sudo apt install popularity-contest`
> 
> Not always a good idea -- see my reply to Tomas. Not always
> physically possible -- a non-privileged user may benefit from the
> documentation of an uninstalled package.

Possible workarounds for that scenario:

* 'apt-get source popularity-contest', find the source of the file
you're looking for in the resulting directory, and read that

* download the .deb from snapshot.debian.org, extract it with 'dpkg -x
filename.deb directory-to-extract-into', find the file you're looking
for in the resulting directory, and read that

There are possibly others.

-- 
   The Wanderer

The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one
persists in trying to adapt the world to himself. Therefore all
progress depends on the unreasonable man. -- George Bernard Shaw



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Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[l0f4r0]

Hi,

30 mai 2020 à 13:14 de p...@hbsys.plus.com:

> `sudo apt install popularity-contest`
>
> then read the manual.
>
I think the OP doesn't want to install the package, otherwise there would be no 
question ;)
I would suggest the following instead:

1) create a directory (a temp one if you prefer):
mkdir popularity-contest-doc && cd popularity-contest-doc

2) download the package:
apt download popularity-contest

3) extract the /usr/share/doc/popularity-contest part (you need to adjust the 
version package X.YY):
dpkg --fsys-tarfile popularity-contest_X.YY_all.deb | tar x --directory . 
./usr/share/doc/popularity-contest

4) read what you want in the usr/share/doc/popularity-contest/ subfolder

Of course, the method indicated by Tomas is great and may be easier than mine 
(+ doesn't leave Debian package files on your computer).

Best regards,
l0f4r0

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Richard Owlett]

On 05/30/2020 06:14 AM, Peter Hillier-Brook wrote:

On 30/05/2020 10:52, Richard Owlett wrote:

I the recent thread about returning a Debian installation to its
original state "popularity-contest" was mentioned.

I wished to compare it to other tools mentioned in that thread.
Obvious stating point -- read the man page.
As I never installed its package I went to
https://manpages.debian.org/buster/popularity-contest/popularity-contest.8.en.html
.

It did not explicitly answer my question.
However, under "SEE ALSO" it stated:

Additional documentation is in /usr/share/doc/popularity-contest/.


*PROBLEM*
As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT* exist.

Where to find required documentation on the web?

NOTE BENE
This post is about man pages as a class.


`sudo apt install popularity-contest`


Not always a good idea -- see my reply to Tomas.
Not always physically possible -- a non-privileged user may benefit from 
the documentation of an uninstalled package.




then read the manual.

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Richard Owlett]

On 05/30/2020 05:57 AM, to...@tuxteam.de wrote:

On Sat, May 30, 2020 at 04:52:47AM -0500, Richard Owlett wrote:

I the recent thread about returning a Debian installation to its
original state "popularity-contest" was mentioned.

I wished to compare it to other tools mentioned in that thread.
Obvious stating point -- read the man page.
As I never installed its package I went to 
https://manpages.debian.org/buster/popularity-contest/popularity-contest.8.en.html
.


_Clarification by OP_

I had not installed popularity-contest _for cause_:
  a. its phone-home feature violates my security & privacy policy.
  b. it would pull in unneeded packages which might interfere with
 intentionally installed package(s) to serve similar functions.



It did not explicitly answer my question.
However, under "SEE ALSO" it stated:

Additional documentation is in /usr/share/doc/popularity-contest/.


*PROBLEM*
As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT* exist.

Where to find required documentation on the web?

NOTE BENE
This post is about man pages as a class.


Of course, it would be nice to have everything in the man page.
That is in general difficult, since upstream doesn't always
do it this way -- packaging isn't the place to change that.

That said, it's possible to browse Debian packages sources
in the 'net.

I'll show how to do it based on your concrete example.

First, the structure of a source package doesn't correspond
to the installed binary package; the reference given in the
above "SEE ALSO" is relative to the binary package. So first
you have a look at popularity-contest's "list of files", that's
in  (I'm assuming buster):

   https://packages.debian.org/buster/all/popularity-contest/filelist

(Of course you can click your way through to this URL).


I strongly recommend that methodology to those reading this thread 
because they have a similar problem. I suspect that in the long term, 
having followed the intervening links and cross references will prove 
more valuable than the targeted final URLs.




You can see that in /usr/share/doc/... there is a FAQ, a README,
a changelog, a copyright and a subdirectory examples.

Now you go to the corresponding place in :

   https://sources.debian.org/src/popularity-contest/1.67/

There they are: FAQ, README and examples (the two missing ones
are Debian infrastructure and live in the subdir debian).

Note that it won't work this way always and 100%, because
package installation /might/ do some magic, which you may
look up in debian/rules, debian/postinst, etc. -- but that's
it, more or less.

Enjoy
-- tomás



Thank you.

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[Peter Hillier-Brook]

On 30/05/2020 10:52, Richard Owlett wrote:
> I the recent thread about returning a Debian installation to its
> original state "popularity-contest" was mentioned.
> 
> I wished to compare it to other tools mentioned in that thread.
> Obvious stating point -- read the man page.
> As I never installed its package I went to
> https://manpages.debian.org/buster/popularity-contest/popularity-contest.8.en.html
> .
> 
> It did not explicitly answer my question.
> However, under "SEE ALSO" it stated:
>> Additional documentation is in /usr/share/doc/popularity-contest/.
> 
> *PROBLEM*
> As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT* exist.
> 
> Where to find required documentation on the web?
> 
> NOTE BENE
> This post is about man pages as a class.

`sudo apt install popularity-contest`

then read the manual.

Re: Debian man pages have annoying feature(sic)

[tomas]

On Sat, May 30, 2020 at 04:52:47AM -0500, Richard Owlett wrote:
> I the recent thread about returning a Debian installation to its
> original state "popularity-contest" was mentioned.
> 
> I wished to compare it to other tools mentioned in that thread.
> Obvious stating point -- read the man page.
> As I never installed its package I went to 
> https://manpages.debian.org/buster/popularity-contest/popularity-contest.8.en.html
> .
> 
> It did not explicitly answer my question.
> However, under "SEE ALSO" it stated:
> >Additional documentation is in /usr/share/doc/popularity-contest/.
> 
> *PROBLEM*
> As package is not installed, that directory does *NOT* exist.
> 
> Where to find required documentation on the web?
> 
> NOTE BENE
> This post is about man pages as a class.

Of course, it would be nice to have everything in the man page.
That is in general difficult, since upstream doesn't always
do it this way -- packaging isn't the place to change that.

That said, it's possible to browse Debian packages sources
in the 'net.

I'll show how to do it based on your concrete example.

First, the structure of a source package doesn't correspond
to the installed binary package; the reference given in the
above "SEE ALSO" is relative to the binary package. So first
you have a look at popularity-contest's "list of files", that's
in  (I'm assuming buster):

  https://packages.debian.org/buster/all/popularity-contest/filelist

(Of course you can click your way through to this URL).

You can see that in /usr/share/doc/... there is a FAQ, a README,
a changelog, a copyright and a subdirectory examples.

Now you go to the corresponding place in :

  https://sources.debian.org/src/popularity-contest/1.67/

There they are: FAQ, README and examples (the two missing ones
are Debian infrastructure and live in the subdir debian).

Note that it won't work this way always and 100%, because
package installation /might/ do some magic, which you may
look up in debian/rules, debian/postinst, etc. -- but that's
it, more or less.

Enjoy
-- tomás


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