Re: bin/45980: Manual file indexing no longer supports compressed manual pages

[Abhinav Upadhyay <er.abhinav.upadhyay%gmail.com@localhost>]

On Sat, Feb 11, 2012 at 5:45 PM, Matthias Scheler 
<tron%zhadum.org.uk@localhost> wrote:
> The following reply was made to PR bin/45980; it has been noted by GNATS.
>
> From: Matthias Scheler <tron%zhadum.org.uk@localhost>
> To: gnats-bugs%NetBSD.org@localhost
> Cc:
> Subject: Re: bin/45980: Manual file indexing no longer supports compressed
>  manual pages
> Date: Sat, 11 Feb 2012 12:10:22 +0000
>
>  On Fri, Feb 10, 2012 at 11:00:00PM +0000, gnats-admin%netbsd.org@localhost 
> wrote:
>  > Thank you very much for your problem report.
>  > It has the internal identification `bin/45980'.
>  > The individual assigned to look at your
>  > report is: bin-bug-people.
>  >
>  > >Category:       bin
>  > >Responsible:    bin-bug-people
>  > >Synopsis:       Manual file indexing no longer supports compressed manual 
> pages
>  > >Arrival-Date:   Fri Feb 10 23:00:00 +0000 2012
>
>  The problem isn't related to compressed manual pages. The new tool
>  e.g. insists on having an ".Nd" section in each manual page.
>  Without that section the file won't get indexed.
>
>  makewhatis(8) support this kind of manual pages without problems.
>
>        Kind regards
>
>  --
>  Matthias Scheler                                  http://zhadum.org.uk/
>

Hello,

Yes, currently makemandb is not able to index compressed man pages. I
believe it is possible to add the support for compressed man pages in
the tool, but I think a better solution would be to get the proper
support for compressed man pages in mandoc itself.

It would also report a lot of error for man pages which consist of
nothing but simple .so macros, Joerg has sent an email to tech-pkg to
fix such man pages.

Any other failure apart from the above two reasons should be a strong
indicator a bug in the man page. The most common source of such bug is
the NAME section, as you pointed out. These pages should be fixed.

--
Abhinav