[PATCH] man: use less as default pager and parse DEFINE lines defining pager

[walter harms]

Am 02.06.2013 18:03, schrieb Tito:
> On Sunday 02 June 2013 14:01:01 John Spencer wrote:
>> On 06/02/2013 01:48 PM, Tito wrote:
>>> On Sunday 02 June 2013 12:51:21 John Spencer wrote:
>>>> man.config can define lines such as
>>>> DEFINE         pager   less -s
>>>>
>>>> this patch parses them, additionally it always sets pager to less
>>>> instead of more.
>>>>
>>>> Signed-off-by: John Spencer<maillist-busybox at barfooze.de>
>>>>
>>>>
>>>
>>>
>>> +               /* environment overrides setting from man.config */
>>> +               const char* env_pager = getenv("MANPAGER");
>>> +               if (!env_pager) env_pager = getenv("PAGER");
>>> +               if (env_pager) pager = env_pager;
>>> +               if (!pager) pager = "less";
>>>
>>> Hi,
>>
>> hi,
>>
>>> what if there is no less on the system?
>>> Maybe we should check at config time that at least one
>>> of the pagers (more, less) is enabled an use that as default
>>> and eventually if both are enabled prefer less.
>>
>> 1) more should always just be a simple wrapper around less
> Hi,
> who says that?
> 
> debian:~$ ls -la /bin/more
> -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 34476 Dec  9 17:56 /bin/more
> debian:~$ ls -la /bin/less
> -rwxr-xr-x 1 root root 145320 Jun 10  2012 /bin/less
> 
>> 2) it's possible to build busybox without less and more, and use the 
>> "real less" package from elsewhere - just because busybox' less is not 
>> built does not guarantee it's missing.
> 
> In this case when both more and less are not busybox applets you
> can set whatever default you like depending on your taste but
> you cannot foresee other users setup.
> I prefer solutions that work out of the box 
> and it makes sense to me to set one of them as default
> if they are compiled in because this "Surely works®".
> 
>> 3) in case both more and less are missing, the sysadmin can now DEFINE 
>> the pager via /etc/man.config
> 
> Yes, this seems one more good argument to set sane defaults e.g.
> busybox applets as the sysdmin can overturn this settings easily
> if your patch is applied.
>  
> Ciao,
> Tito
>>>
>>> Just my 2 cents.
>>>

more is specified by POSIX less not (correct my if i am wrong)
therefor any sane man will use "more" and let the user define
new pager if more is not available,

re,
 wh