excerpts from: man man; ...
MANWIDTH If set to a numeric value, used as the width manpages
should be displayed. Otherwise, if set to a special
value "tty", and output is to a terminal, the pages may
be displayed over the whole width of the screen.
MANCOLOR If set, enables color support.
...
set MANWIDTH="tty"; ### or even set MANWIDTH="240";
set MANCOLOR;
man whatever; ### still @ 80 columns (my screen @ 240x75) without color
