On Catalina, how can I add a man page to /usr/share/man (or other manpage location searched in the path). I was able to install the executable in /usr/local/bin but trying to install the man page I get "Read-only file system".
https://support.apple.com/en-us/HT210650
As a work-around I can do $ man ~/pathto/theapplication.man but this is not ideal.
Google didn't help, I'm not on linux. Thanks in advance.
MacBook Air 13″, macOS 10.15
In either ~/.bash_profile, or ~/.zshrc (depending on your shell), add the following line to pick up the following man page locations:
/usr/local/share/man
/usr/share/man
export MANPATH="/usr/local/share/man:/usr/share/man:$MANPATH"
and then from the Terminal command line, apply either of the specific dot files (without brackets) per your current shell:
source [ ~/.bash_profile | ~/.zshrc ]
A man page in the current directory can be viewed as:
man ./htop.1
aoc_theotherone wrote:
I was able to install the executable in /usr/local/bin but trying to install the man page I get "Read-only file system".
How did you do that? Normally, when building an open source package like this, you would provide a “prefix” such as /usr/local and everything would be automatically installed there. That is actually the default install prefix for most such tools.
As I understand MacOS, your answer is all wrong. /usr/share/man is already in my manpath, and your proposal would break it. We are not supposed to set the MANPATH in the shell. MacOS uses a different mechanism.
$ echo ${MANPATH}
# returns nothing, i.e. not set
$ manpath
/usr/local/man:etc.:etc.
I'm not asking how to add /usr/share/man to manpath. I'm asking how to copy a file into a subfoldet there, which MacOS is not letting me.
The package came with *.h, *.c, Makefile, and theapplication.man. There was no configure or install step. I did:
$ make -f Makefile
$ sudo -i
$ mkdir /usr/local/bin
$ cp ./theapplication /usr/local/bin
This works fine for all users. I checked permissions and they are all proper. /usr/local/bin is already in the path. It's the next one that failed with "Read-only file system":
$ cp ./theapplication.man /usr/share/man/man1
N.B. /usr/share/man is already in the MacOS manpath (but not in the MANPATH environment variable).
Yes, that's it. Sorry I doubted you.
$ manpath
doesn't list that location, but
$ man -d theapplication
does list it.
I created the folder, copied theapplication.man there, renamed to theapplication.1, and it works.
Thanks for the help.
So why not copy the man file to /usr/local/share/man/man1?
I already know how to display a man page that's not in the manpath.
how to add a man page to /usr/share/man
