NAME

       manpath - format of the /etc/manpath.config file

DESCRIPTION

       The  manpath  configuration  file  is  used  by the manual page utilities to assess users'
       manpaths at run time, to indicate which manual  page  hierarchies  (manpaths)  are  to  be
       treated  as  system  hierarchies and to assign them directories to be used for storing cat
       files.

       If the environment variable $MANPATH is already  set,  the  information  contained  within
       /etc/manpath.config will not override it.

SEARCH PATH

       By  default, man-db examines the user's $PATH.  For each path_element found there, it adds
       manpath_element to the search path.

       If there is no MANPATH_MAP line in the configuration file for a given  path_element,  then
       it  adds  all  of  path_element/../man,  path_element/man,  path_element/../share/man, and
       path_element/share/man that exist as directories to the search path.

       It then adds any MANDATORY_MANPATH entries from the configuration file to the search path.

       Finally, if the --systems option is used or the $SYSTEM environment variable is set,  then
       that should consist of a sequence of operating system names separated by commas or colons.
       This acts as a template, expanding the search path once more  to  allow  access  to  other
       operating  systems'  manual  pages:  for each system name, man-db looks for that name as a
       subdirectory of each entry in the search path, and adds it to the final search path if  it
       exists.   A system name of man inserts the normal search path without subdirectories.  For
       example, if the search path would otherwise have been  /usr/share/man:/usr/local/man,  and
       $SYSTEM    is    set    to    newOS:man,    then   the   final   search   path   will   be
       /usr/share/man/newOS:/usr/share/man:/usr/local/man/newOS:/usr/local/man.

       The $MANPATH environment variable overrides man-db's default  manual  page  search  paths.
       Most  users  should  not  need  to set it.  Its syntax is similar to the $PATH environment
       variable: it consists of a sequence of directory names separated by colons.  It  overrides
       the default search path described above.

       If the value of $MANPATH starts with a colon, then the default search path is added at its
       start.  If the value of $MANPATH ends with a colon, then the default search path is  added
       at  its  end.   If  the  value  of $MANPATH contains a double colon (::), then the default
       search path is inserted in the middle of the value, between the two colons.

FORMAT

       The following field types are currently recognised:

       # comment
              Blank lines or those beginning with a # will be treated as comments and ignored.

       MANDATORY_MANPATH manpath_element
              Lines of this form indicate manpaths that every  automatically  generated  $MANPATH
              should contain.  This will typically include /usr/man.

       MANPATH_MAP path_element manpath_element
              Lines  of this form set up $PATH to $MANPATH mappings.  For each path_element found
              in the user's $PATH, manpath_element will be added to the $MANPATH.

       MANDB_MAP manpath_element [ catpath_element ]
              Lines of this form indicate which manpaths are to be treated  as  system  manpaths,
              and  optionally  where  their  cat  files  should  be  stored.   This field type is
              particularly important if  man  is  a  setuid  program,  as  (when  in  the  system
              configuration  file /etc/manpath.config rather than the per-user configuration file
              .manpath) it indicates which manual page hierarchies to access as the  setuid  user
              and which as the invoking user.

              The  system  manual  page  hierarchies  are usually those stored under /usr such as
              /usr/man, /usr/local/man and /usr/X11R6/man.

              If cat pages from a particular manpath_element are not to be stored or  are  to  be
              stored in the traditional location, catpath_element may be omitted.

              Traditional  cat  placement  would  be impossible for read only mounted manual page
              hierarchies and because of this it is  possible  to  specify  any  valid  directory
              hierarchy for their storage.  To observe the Linux FSSTND the keyword FSSTND can be
              used in place of an actual directory.

              Unfortunately, it is necessary to specify all  system  man  tree  paths,  including
              alternate operating system paths such as /usr/man/sun and any NLS locale paths such
              as /usr/man/de_DE.88591.

              As the information is parsed line by line in the order written, it is necessary for
              any  manpath  that  is  a  sub-hierarchy  of  another hierarchy to be listed first,
              otherwise an incorrect match will be made.  An example is that /usr/man/de_DE.88591
              must come before /usr/man.

       DEFINE key value
              Lines  of  this  form define miscellaneous configuration variables; see the default
              configuration file for those variables used by the manual  pager  utilities.   They
              include  default paths to various programs (such as grep and tbl), and default sets
              of arguments to those programs.

       SECTION section ...
              Lines of this form define the order in which manual sections  should  be  searched.
              If there are no SECTION directives in the configuration file, the default is:

                     SECTION 1 n l 8 3 0 2 3type 5 4 9 6 7

              If multiple SECTION directives are given, their section lists will be concatenated.

              If  a particular extension is not in this list (say, 1mh) it will be displayed with
              the rest of the section it belongs to.  The effect of this is that you only need to
              explicitly  list extensions if you want to force a particular order.  Sections with
              extensions should usually be adjacent to their main section (e.g. "1 1mh 8 ...").

              SECTIONS is accepted as an alternative name for this directive.

       MINCATWIDTH width
              If the terminal width is less than  width,  cat  pages  will  not  be  created  (if
              missing) or displayed.  The default is 80.

       MAXCATWIDTH width
              If  the  terminal  width  is  greater than width, cat pages will not be created (if
              missing) or displayed.  The default is 80.

       CATWIDTH width
              If width is non-zero, cat pages will always be formatted  for  a  terminal  of  the
              given  width,  regardless  of  the width of the terminal actually being used.  This
              overrides MINCATWIDTH and MAXCATWIDTH.

       NOCACHE
              This flag prevents man(1) from creating cat pages automatically.

BUGS

       Unless the rules above are followed and observed precisely,  the  manual  pager  utilities
       will not function as desired.  The rules are overly complicated.

       https://gitlab.com/man-db/man-db/-/issues
       https://savannah.nongnu.org/bugs/?group=man-db