Ask HN: Why is it called an “on-line” man page | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: Why is it called an “on-line” man page

2 pointsnishs2 comments

Running

  $ man man

brings up the manual page for "man", which refers to itself as "on-line" manual pages. What does on-line mean in this context?

  man(1)                                           man(1)

  NAME
         man - format and display the on-line manual pages

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In the old days, when I first started using Unix (around 1979), the Unix documentation was also available in printed manuals. I'd guess that the paper version was the "off-line" version and the one output by "man" on the terminal was the "on-line" version. (I still have a set of Version 7 Unix manuals in my basement.)

It means you read it on your computer. You don't need to go find the hardcopy.

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