>Number:         24296
>Category:       bin
>Synopsis:       Proposed additions to the ftp man page
>Confidential:   no
>Severity:       non-critical
>Priority:       low
>Responsible:    bin-bug-people
>State:          open
>Class:          doc-bug
>Submitter-Id:   net
>Arrival-Date:   Sun Feb 01 22:25:00 UTC 2004
>Closed-Date:
>Last-Modified:
>Originator:     David H. Gutteridge
>Release:        N/A
>Organization:
>Environment:
N/A
>Description:
The current man page for ftp doesn't mention the fact that macdef names can be a maximum of eight characters, and isn't clear enough (in my opinion) that macdefs are only applicable to a particular machine definition or session.  Accordingly, I've submitted a proposed patch (against v. 1.101 as current in CVS) under "fix to the problem" below.
>How-To-Repeat:

>Fix:
--- ftp.1~	Sun Feb  1 16:52:15 2004
+++ ftp.1	Sun Feb  1 17:07:24 2004
@@ -64,7 +64,7 @@
 .\"
 .\"	@(#)ftp.1	8.3 (Berkeley) 10/9/94
 .\"
-.Dd December 19, 2003
+.Dd February 1, 2004
 .Dt FTP 1
 .Os
 .Sh NAME
@@ -667,8 +667,12 @@
 in a file or
 carriage returns from the terminal) terminates macro input mode.
 There is a limit of 16 macros and 4096 total characters in all
-defined macros.
-Macros remain defined until a
+defined macros.  Macro names can be a maximum of 8 characters.
+Macros are only applicable to the current session they are
+defined within (or if defined outside a session, to the session
+invoked with the next
+.Ic open
+command), and remain defined until a
 .Ic close
 command is executed.
 The macro processor interprets `$' and `\e' as special characters.
@@ -2024,8 +2028,19 @@
 next
 .Pa .netrc
 line and continue until a blank line (consecutive new-line
-characters) is encountered.
-If a macro named
+characters) is encountered.  Like the other tokens in the
+.Pa .netrc
+file, a
+.Ic macdef
+is applicable only to the
+.Ic machine
+definition preceding it.  A
+.Ic macdef
+entry cannot be utilized by multiple
+.Ic machine
+definitions; rather, it must be defined following each
+.Ic machine
+it is intended to be used with.  If a macro named
 .Ic init
 is defined, it is automatically executed as the last step in the
 auto-login process.
>Release-Note:
>Audit-Trail:
>Unformatted: