Annotation of src/usr.bin/man/help.1, Revision 1.4
1.4 ! jmc 1: .\" $OpenBSD: help.1,v 1.3 2000/10/18 16:49:17 aaron Exp $
! 2: .\"
! 3: .\" Copyright (c) 1999 Aaron Campbell
! 4: .\" All rights reserved.
! 5: .\"
! 6: .\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without
! 7: .\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
! 8: .\" are met:
! 9: .\"
! 10: .\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright
! 11: .\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
! 12: .\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright
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! 14: .\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution.
! 15: .\" 3. All advertising materials mentioning features or use of this software
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! 17: .\" This product includes software developed by Aaron Campbell.
! 18: .\" 4. The name of the author may not be used to endorse or promote products
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1.1 aaron 32: .Dd October 17, 1999
33: .Dt HELP 1
34: .Os
35: .Sh NAME
36: .Nm help
37: .Nd help for new users and administrators
38: .Sh DESCRIPTION
1.2 deraadt 39: This document is meant to familiarize new users and system administrators with
1.1 aaron 40: .Ox
41: and, if necessary,
42: .Ux
43: in general.
44: .Pp
45: Firstly, a wealth of information is contained within the system manual pages.
46: In
47: .Ux ,
48: the
49: .Xr man 1
50: command is used to view them.
51: Type
52: .Ic man man
53: for instructions on how to use it properly.
54: Pay especially close attention to the
55: .Fl k
56: option.
57: .Pp
58: Other
59: .Ox
60: references include the FAQ (Frequently Asked Questions) located at
1.2 deraadt 61: .Pa http://www.openbsd.org/faq ,
1.1 aaron 62: which is mostly intended for administrators and assumes the reader possesses
63: a working knowledge of
64: .Ux .
65: There are also mailing lists in place where questions are fielded by
66: .Ox
67: developers and other users; see
1.2 deraadt 68: .Pa http://www.openbsd.org/mail.html .
1.1 aaron 69: .Pp
70: System administrators should have already read the
71: .Xr afterboot 8
72: man page which explains a variety of tasks that are typically performed
73: after the first system boot.
74: When configuring any aspect of the system, first consider any possible security
75: implications your changes may have.
76: .Ss The Unix shell
77: After logging in, some system messages are typically displayed, and then the
78: user is able to enter commands to be processed by the shell program.
79: The shell is a command-line interpreter that reads user input (normally from
80: a terminal) and executes commands.
81: There are many different shells available;
82: .Ox
83: ships with
84: .Xr csh 1 ,
85: .Xr ksh 1 ,
86: and
87: .Xr sh 1 .
88: Each user's shell is indicated by the last field of their corresponding entry
89: in the system password file
90: .Pf ( Pa /etc/passwd ) .
91: .Ss Basic Unix commands
92: .Bl -tag -width logout
93: .It Cm man
94: Interface to the system manual pages.
95: For any of the commands listed below, type
96: .Ic man <command>
97: for detailed information on what it does and how to use it.
98: .It Cm pwd
99: Print working directory.
100: Files are organized in a hierarchy (see
101: .Xr hier 7 )
102: called a tree.
103: This command will indicate in which directory you are currently located.
104: .It Cm cd
105: Change working directory.
106: Use this command to navigate throughout the file hierarchy.
107: For example, type
108: .Ic cd /
109: to change the working directory to the root.
110: .It Cm ls
111: List directory contents.
112: Type
113: .Ic ls -l
114: for a detailed listing.
115: .It Cm cat
116: Although it has many more uses,
1.3 aaron 117: .Ic cat filename
1.1 aaron 118: will print the contents of a plain-text file to the screen.
119: .It Cm mkdir
120: Make a directory.
121: For example,
1.3 aaron 122: .Ic mkdir foobar .
1.1 aaron 123: .It Cm rmdir
124: Remove a directory.
125: .It Cm rm
126: Remove files.
127: Files are generally only removable by their owners.
128: See the
129: .Xr chmod 1
130: command for information on file permissions.
131: .It Cm chmod
132: Change file modes, including permissions.
133: It is not immediately obvious how to use this command; please read its manual
134: page carefully, as proper file permissions, especially on system files, are
135: vital in maintaining security and integrity.
136: .It Cm cp
137: Copy files.
138: .It Cm mv
139: Move and rename files.
140: .It Cm ps
141: List active processes.
142: Most
143: .Ux Ns -based
144: operating systems, including
145: .Ox ,
146: are multitasking, meaning many programs share system resources at the same
147: time.
148: A common usage is
149: .Ic ps -auxw ,
150: which will display information about all active processes.
151: .It Cm kill
152: Kill processes.
153: Used mostly for terminating run-away/unresponsive programs, but also used to
154: signal programs for requesting certain operations (i.e., re-read their
155: configuration).
156: .It Cm date
157: Print the current system date and time.
158: .It Cm mail
159: Access mailbox.
160: .It Cm logout
161: Log out of the system.
162: .El
163: .Pp
164: When a command is entered, it is first checked to see if it is built-in to the
165: shell.
166: If not, the shell looks for the command in any directories contained within the
167: .Ev PATH
168: environment variable (see
169: .Xr environ 7 ) .
170: If the command is not found, an error message is printed.
171: Otherwise, the shell runs the command, passing it any arguments specified on
172: the command line.
173: .Sh SEE ALSO
174: .Xr man 1 ,
175: .Xr whatis 1 ,
176: .Xr whereis 1 ,
177: .Xr afterboot 8
178: .Sh HISTORY
179: This manual page was written by Aaron Campbell <aaron@openbsd.org> and first
180: appeared in
181: .Ox 2.6 .
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