"brian m. carlson" <sand...@crustytoothpaste.ath.cx> wrote: > Package: coreutils > Version: 6.10-6 > Severity: normal > > The manpage for id does not describe what information it prints. It > should state that by default, the information printed is the username > and userid, default/current group name and group id, and the list of > groups (and the group ids) to which that user belongs, instead of merely > stating "Without any OPTION, print some useful set of identified [sic] > information." > > The description should be changed from "Print information for USERNAME, > or the current user." to "Print information about the user and groups > for the user specified by USERNAME, or the current user if USERNAME is > not specified."
Good idea. > A user who has never heard of id should be able to determine how to > properly use it by looking solely at the manual page. In its current > state, that's apparently not the case; hence, this bug. > > If you specify whether you'd like the manpage in man, mdoc, or DocBook > 5.0 format, I'll happily provide you with a non-autogenerated manpage > with useful information. Thanks! If you'd like to contribute more to coreutils, instructions/guidelines are here: http://git.sv.gnu.org/cgit/coreutils.git/plain/HACKING I'll soon push the following change upstream: >From 4ca909e06dbc8dfa998b70d28a8fbf95991c12b1 Mon Sep 17 00:00:00 2001 From: Jim Meyering <meyer...@redhat.com> Date: Sat, 14 Feb 2009 09:09:17 +0100 Subject: [PATCH] doc: id: make --help and .man more descriptive * src/id.c (usage): Improve description, based on a suggestion from Brian M. Carlson in http://bugs.debian.org/514675 * man/id.x: Use a better one-liner, based on the one at top of id.c. --- THANKS | 1 + man/id.x | 2 +- src/id.c | 3 ++- 3 files changed, 4 insertions(+), 2 deletions(-) diff --git a/THANKS b/THANKS index a3f9801..bedb01a 100644 --- a/THANKS +++ b/THANKS @@ -82,6 +82,7 @@ Bob Proulx r...@fc.hp.com Branden Robinson bran...@necrotic.deadbeast.net Brendan O'Dea b...@compusol.com.au Brian Kimball b...@footbag.org +Brian M. Carlson sand...@crustytoothpaste.ath.cx Brian Silverman bsilver...@conceptxdesign.com Brian Youmans 3d...@gnu.org Bruce Korb bk...@veritas.com diff --git a/man/id.x b/man/id.x index 4c990ac..d55b326 100644 --- a/man/id.x +++ b/man/id.x @@ -1,4 +1,4 @@ [NAME] -id \- print user identity +id \- print real and effective user and group IDs [DESCRIPTION] .\" Add any additional description here diff --git a/src/id.c b/src/id.c index 05ad2d8..78f78e0 100644 --- a/src/id.c +++ b/src/id.c @@ -81,7 +81,8 @@ usage (int status) { printf (_("Usage: %s [OPTION]... [USERNAME]\n"), program_name); fputs (_("\ -Print information for USERNAME, or the current user.\n\ +Print user and group information for the specified USERNAME,\n\ +or (when USERNAME omitted) for the current user.\n\ \n\ -a ignore, for compatibility with other versions\n\ -Z, --context print only the security context of the current user\n\ -- 1.6.2.rc0.234.g2cc0b3 -- To UNSUBSCRIBE, email to debian-bugs-dist-requ...@lists.debian.org with a subject of "unsubscribe". Trouble? Contact listmas...@lists.debian.org