On Sun, 26 Oct 2025, 15:37 Sandra Loosemore, <[email protected]> wrote:
> The "Option Summary" in the GCC documentation now runs 30+ pages in the > printed manual, and would be even longer if I added all the options > presently missing documentation. Besides its length, there are no > direct links from the options it names, to their documentation -- only > to the containing section, many of which are also dozens of pages long. > (The alphabetical option index at the end of the manual does link > directly to the @opindex tag location in the detailed documentation.) > Nowadays hardly anybody uses a paper manual and can rely on the search > feature in their browser or PDF viewer to find what they're looking for > instead, so perhaps the lack of direct links isn't a fatal flaw, but > since the whole document is searchable, is the "Option Summary" still > helpful to point you in the right direction? Do you find it useful? > > For some context: when I'm writing I like to have a clear purpose in > mind for each section of the document. I'm having a hard time figuring > out what the purpose of the "Option Summary" is. :-S Maybe it made > sense 30+ years ago when GCC had many fewer options and most people > relied on a paper manual, but what about now? > I find it invaluable, it's usually where I go to first when looking something up in the online html pages. I don't know which of the many, many pages an option is on, so I go to the summary, search for the option, then click through to the relevant page and search again to get to the option.
