https://manpages.debian.org/ is a service providing online manpages in HTML format for the public.

Contents

  1. Current status
    1. Debian manpages archive
    2. Current implementation
    3. New implementation
  2. Hardware
  3. Forum

Current status

Debian manpages archive

[Services/Debian manpages archive][edit]

Current implementation

The current manpages.debian.org service is a simple Perl CGI script running on manziarly.debian.org. This script searches within an archive that is generated through another set of scripts. The source code is available in http://anonscm.debian.org/viewvc/ddp/man-cgi/

In the past (when running in glinka.debian.org) this service was disabled by Teams/DSA several times because of performance issues. Even though the service has been modified to improve caching (on memory and on disk) it still was getting hit hard by robots that request Apache manpages. This excessive traffic is generated as many default Apache installations in Debian include links to these manpages (see http://bugs.debian.org/821313).

The last time it was disabled was in August 2016, and remain in that state until it was re-activated in December 2016.

New implementation

The current codebase is being rewritten from scratch by TheAnarcat into a package called Debmans. See the design document for a discussion on the implementation.

At this point, the debmans code can extract all files from a mirror efficiently and convert them to HTML. It has not been tested on a full mirror yet, because TheAnarcat is waiting for manpages group access and dependencies install (setuptools from backports and/or python-click, python-apt and python-debian) in manzarly. See the TODO file for more information about the current status of the project and limitations.

For Debian maintainers not wishing to operate on the Gitlab platform, there is also a collab-maint repository that is synchronised with Gitlab every hour.

Hardware

The service is running in manziarly.debian.org. It used to run on glinka.debian.org.

Forum

Discussions about manpages.debian.org can take place on the regular Teams/DDP channels, for example the #debian-doc IRC channel and debian-doc@lists.debian.org mailing list.

You can also subscribe to this wiki page to get updates, which also functions as an ad-hoc forum.