# Some manpage-related stuff you might want to turn on
**URL:** https://discourse.nixos.org/t/some-manpage-related-stuff-you-might-want-to-turn-on/38835
**Category:** Guides
**Created:** [January 26, 2024, 6:17am UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/some-manpage-related-stuff-you-might-want-to-turn-on/38835 "2024-01-26T06:17:07Z")
**Posts on this page:** 10
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Irene](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/Irene)
#### Post date: [January 26, 2024, 6:17am UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/some-manpage-related-stuff-you-might-want-to-turn-on/38835/1 "2024-01-26T06:17:07Z")
This is one of those things that Unix newcomers in particular would probably benefit from, but not know to ask for. I posted about it originally over on the fediverse, but when I saw this category I realized it belongs here.
```auto
{ pkgs, ... }:
{
environment.systemPackages = [pkgs.man-pages];
documentation = {
dev.enable = true;
man.generateCaches = true;
nixos.includeAllModules = true;
};
}
```
There’s a bunch of related options under `documentation.*` that you can and should look up; I left out everything that defaults to on.
There are good reasons that these default to off - they use more disk space, and rebuilds take a bit longer - but for a machine that you use interactively it’s well worth it.
The man-pages package is easy to miss, because most programs install their own manpages regardless, so this package just has some very general system-wide stuff. You want that stuff, though! In my view, the importance of `man intro` as a way to welcome first-timers can’t be overstated.
The generateCaches option is needed to make the `apropos` and `whatis` commands work properly. Again, one of those things where the people most in need of it may not even realize it’s supposed to work.
The rest of this is just about turning on docs for a few more things, on the principle that it’s better to have it whether or not you need it.
Another thing you can and should do is type `nixos-help` and see if you’re satisfied with what it does. It should open the NixOS manual in a browser - which one will depend on a lot of stuff. If you’re not, you may need to set `$BROWSER` in your shell config. If you want it to ignore the GUI and work entirely in a terminal, install `w3m` and set `BROWSER=w3m`. I realize it may be a bit quixotic of me to imagine that anyone younger than me wants that, but hey. 🙂
---
### Author:  [@ParetoOptimalDev](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/ParetoOptimalDev)
#### Post date: [January 30, 2024, 1:45am UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/some-manpage-related-stuff-you-might-want-to-turn-on/38835/2 "2024-01-30T01:45:35Z")
Do you know if there is an info equivalent?
---
### Author:  [@Irene](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/Irene)
#### Post date: [January 30, 2024, 2:00am UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/some-manpage-related-stuff-you-might-want-to-turn-on/38835/3 "2024-01-30T02:00:15Z")
the only option under `documentation.info` is `documentation.info.enable`, and it defaults to true, so no action needed.
I don’t think info has an index that needs to be rebuilt in the same way man does, but I have never managed to form a close emotional connection with the info system (the keybindings have confused me every time I’ve tried, for thirty years now), so I’m not totally sure
is that what you were asking?
---
### Author:  [@Irene](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/Irene)
#### Post date: [January 30, 2024, 2:12am UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/some-manpage-related-stuff-you-might-want-to-turn-on/38835/4 "2024-01-30T02:12:54Z")
looking through all-packages.nix it does look like there’s things like glibcInfo which people might want to install. there’s also a couple specialized packages of manpages that we’re not fully sure of the contents of. taking inventory of all this and making recommendations about it might be an interesting project for somebody (I might do it at some point but I dunno when I’ll have time).
---
### Author:  [@ParetoOptimalDev](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/ParetoOptimalDev)
#### Post date: [January 30, 2024, 4:52pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/some-manpage-related-stuff-you-might-want-to-turn-on/38835/5 "2024-01-30T16:52:48Z")
> the only option under `documentation.info` is `documentation.info.enable`, and it defaults to true, so no action needed.
Yes, thank you!
> I have never managed to form a close emotional connection with the info system (the keybindings have confused me every time I’ve tried, for thirty years now), so I’m not totally sure
Within emacs if you get used to it it’s much nicer than man pages because of the hierarchy and it’s ability to explain things I think.
Not sure if this is relevant, but I always link these videos when someone brings up not being fond of emacs info manuals:
[ ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ozrGXYQIBHg)
[![](https://discourse.nixos.org/uploads/default/original/2X/a/acd10bcc855986bd0ec7634bd2c889a54984fa5d.jpeg "Enjoy Reading Documentation With "Info" in Emacs") ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Lpj2-pepPE)
May not change anything for you, but for me it made my computing experience much nicer 🙂
---
### Author:  [@ParetoOptimalDev](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/ParetoOptimalDev)
#### Post date: [January 30, 2024, 4:53pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/some-manpage-related-stuff-you-might-want-to-turn-on/38835/6 "2024-01-30T16:53:21Z")
> [@Irene](#):
>
> looking through all-packages.nix it does look like there’s things like glibcInfo which people might want to install.
Yes, this looks like a good idea. Thank you.
---
### Author:  [@chreekat](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/chreekat)
#### Post date: [February 8, 2024, 3:21pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/some-manpage-related-stuff-you-might-want-to-turn-on/38835/7 "2024-02-08T15:21:39Z")
Thanks for this! I had discovered `documentation.dev.enable` a few years ago, but had consigned myself to `man -K` instead of `man -k`/`apropos` since I didn’t know about `documentation.man.generateCaches` (or maybe it didn’t exist in 2019?). Yay!
---
### Author:  [@Irene](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/Irene)
#### Post date: [February 9, 2024, 3:42am UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/some-manpage-related-stuff-you-might-want-to-turn-on/38835/8 "2024-02-09T03:42:26Z")
very welcome! yeah, I don’t know the history of the generateCaches option, but it always bothered me that apropos doesn’t work out of the box, since it was a big part of how I learned Unix in the first place back in the 90s. anyway, today it exists 🙂
---
### Author:  [@Irene](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/Irene)
#### Post date: [September 27, 2025, 5:22pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/some-manpage-related-stuff-you-might-want-to-turn-on/38835/9 "2025-09-27T17:22:56Z")
Thanks, yes, I spent roughly 2002 - 2006 using Emacs and attempting to enjoy it. This followed immediately after using vi from 1994-2001, and afterwards I went back to vi and have used various dialects of it ever since (with a couple brief detours into GUI editors). I gave it a fair chance, more than fair really, and it isn’t shaped like my brain. There are reasons that different people prefer different things in an editor. I am glad that people who like Emacs get to use it, but not everybody is a convert-in-waiting.
---
### Author:  [@zwol](https://discourse.nixos.org/u/zwol)
#### Post date: [September 28, 2025, 5:48pm UTC](https://discourse.nixos.org/t/some-manpage-related-stuff-you-might-want-to-turn-on/38835/10 "2025-09-28T17:48:36Z")
The most basic problem with the command line `info` program is that everyone within GNU who actually _likes_ Texinfo-format documentation is a diehard Emacs user. So Emacs’ built-in reader for that format, `info-mode`, is reasonably good; but what they wrote, as a standalone reader utility, when they eventually accepted that they couldn’t persuade everyone to switch to Emacs, was a _flimsy knockoff of `info-mode`_. That’s why the keybindings are so weird, and why it has never worked very well.
(N.B. I _am_ a diehard Emacs user and I actually find it easier for most purposes to read the [HTML versions of the GNU manuals](https://www.gnu.org/manual/manual.html) than to use _either_. There’s things `info-mode` can do more easily, like full-text search, but the web-browser UI has had so much more polish overall.)
It is also the case that many of the existing Texinfo-format manuals are decades out of date and/or were written as _guides_ rather than _reference manuals_; this is why, for instance, the glibc manual doesn’t document pthreads at all, and the `tar` manual makes you hunt for the options you want. The FSF _used_ to fund professional technical writers to work on their manuals. I don’t know why they stopped.