From: Junio C Hamano <gitster@pobox.com>
Date: Mon, 02 May 2011 00:02:26 GMT
Subject: Re: [PATCH] Add --info-path and --man-path options to git.
Message-ID: <7v62puq8a5.fsf@alter.siamese.dyndns.org>
In-Reply-To: <20110501234833.GC11550@elie>

Jonathan Nieder <jrnieder@gmail.com> writes:

> By contrast, man and info typically use standard search mechanisms:
> man using $MANPATH and info using the dir.info file.  The usual
> interface to git's documentation through a man browser is not
>
> 	man /usr/share/man/man1/git-add.1.gz
>
> but
>
> 	man git-add;	# or "man git add" if your man viewer supports it

I think you are forgetting the case where the git-man-path the user uses
to install git may be outside /usr/share/man (e.g. $HOME/share/man).  In
such an installation, by setting $PATH to include your installed git
binary (e.g. $HOME/bin), you should be able to say "git help -m git" to
tell help.c to internally prepend $HOME/share/man to the $MANPATH before
it kicks "man".  Does "man git-add" work without you knowing where that
directory is (iow, without having $HOME/share/man on $MANPATH)?  And if it
does not, how would you learn what directory to add to your $MANPATH?

Isn't that what this patch is solving?  I am not sure where the similarity
with the html documentation breaks donw.  The same thing for info.