On Sun, 6 Jan 2002, Martin Weber wrote:

> On Sun, Jan 06, 2002 at 06:54:38PM +0100, Thomas Klausner wrote:
> >
> > Currently, the option ordering in our man pages is a mess. To wit:
> > ls(1): A-Za-z
> > pax(1): a-zA-Z
> > make(1): AaBbCc...Zz
> > csh(1): aAbBcC...zZ
> >
> > I'd like to find a unified option order for all man pages and then
> > switch to it.  This will also have an impact on the programs' usage
> > output.

A lot of man pages put their options in a logical order. "pax", for
example, list the principle options '-r' and '-w' first. Alphabetizing
all the man page options will *not* make the man page any easier to
read, but it would certainly increase the effort required to import an
updated version. It's not as if the author of the man page were
unaware that "a" comes before "b" and so on, so he's not likely to
change it just because you ask him to.

> > In my opinion, separating upper and lower case letters doesn't make
> > sense, and makes options harder to find when browsing, so I'm for one
> > of the last two, having a preference for the make(1) ordering (with no
> > particular argument behind that).

> A unified approach will make all manpages easier to browse imho, so, go ahead :))

You guys know, you can do '/-a{CR}' in the pager to skip to the
description for option '-a'?

Frederick