Mail Archives: djgpp/1999/08/29/16:56:31
Martin Str|mberg <ams AT ludd DOT luth DOT se> donated an addition to the README.1ST
file that describes some basic usage of the INFO browser. The relevant
part of the file is reproduced below.
I would like to ask people who have comments about this addition to
please post them herel. In particular, please state your opinions
whether the text gives enough information to read the docs and look up
a specific subject there, and whether the explanations are clear.
Thanks.
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Reading the documentation, or A Crash Course in Info
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The following is not supposed to be a complete guide to using Info,
just a starting point, so you could move around the docs and search it
for whatever you are looking for.
To invoke Info to read a manual, type "info" followed by the manual
name. For example:
- type "info libc" to read the C library docs;
- type "info libc alphabetical printf" to read the documentation
of library function `printf';
- type "info gcc" to read the manual for GCC, the GNU C compiler;
- type "info faq" to read the DJGPP FAQ list;
- type "info make" to read the manual for the Make utility;
To exit Info, press `q' (for Quit).
Once inside Info, you can move around with the usual cursor motion
keys: Up-arrow, Down-arrow, PageDown, PageUp, etc.
To read the entire manual in an orderly fashion, press SPACE every
time you've completed reading a screenful. This will take you through
the entire sequence of chapters and sections of a manual.
Menus are marked by a line that says "* Menu:". Each line below the
menu marker that begins with a "* " is a menu item. To choose a menu
item, position the cursor at the beginning of a line, right under the
asterisk `*', and press [Enter].
Hypertext links are marked by "* Note". To follow the reference,
position the cursor at the asterisk, then press [Enter]. To get back
from the excursion, press `l' (that's a lower-case letter ell, not the
digit one), for "Last".
To quickly search for a certain subject in the index of a manual,
press `i' (for Index), type the subject, then press [Enter]. You can
type only part of the subject name and press TAB, to see whether the
index includes any entries that begin with what you typed. TAB causes
Info to try to complete what you typed using the avialable index
entries; if Info beeps on you or flashes the screen colors, you know
that there are no index entries which begin with what you typed;
delete what you have typed (using the BackSpace key) and try a
different name for what you are looking. If there are some index
entries that begin with what you typed, Info will complete it. If the
completed entry looks like what you are looking for, press [Enter] to
go to the section of the manual that discusses it; if not, press TAB
again to see all the possible completions. If any of the completions
seem right, type enough text to make it uinque and press [Enter]. If
none of the completions seem appropriate, delete what you typed and
try a different subject name.
For example, suppose you get the infamous message "ld.exe: cannot open
-lstdcxx: No such file or directory" and you want to check what the
FAQ has to say about that. You start Info ("info faq"), then press
`i' and type "can TAB". The first TAB just capitalizes "can" into
"Can", so you know there are some index entries which begin with
"Can", and type TAB again. Now you will see a list of potential
completions. Alas, none of them seems to be relevant for this
problem, so you use BackSpace to delete "Can" and then type "-lstd"
followed by TAB. Now the the info program only has one choice so it
completes your search and this time it's exactly what you are looking
for! Now press "RET" to go to that node and read what the FAQ has to
say about this subject.
If you prefer to look up the subject in the index yourself, page
through the top-level menu of the manual until you find a menu entry
that says something like "* Concept Index" or "* Command Index" or
just "* Index", press [Enter] to go to the index, then browse it for
any pertinent entries. An index is just a huge menu sorted in an
alphabetical order, so whenever you find an entry you are looking for,
position the cursor at that line and press [Enter] to go to the
relevant section.
Sometimes the index search isn't good enough (because the indices
cannot list everything). In this case, press `s' (for Search) and
type a string you want to find, then press [Enter]. Info will search
the entire manual for this string and position you at the first
occurrence. To search for the next occurrence, press `s' again and
then [Enter]: Info will repeat the search.
Info has many more commands and options. To find out, from the
command line type "info info". To find out even more, type
"info info-standalone".
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