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Date: 09 Mar 2002 23:18:23 -0800
From: "Gary W. Swearingen" <swear@blarg.net>
Reply-To: swear@blarg.net
To: FreeBSD-gnats-submit@freebsd.org
Subject: misc/35727: man(1) program should not display (old) dates in footers.
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>Number:         35727
>Category:       misc
>Synopsis:       man(1) program should not display (old) dates in footers.
>Confidential:   no
>Severity:       non-critical
>Priority:       low
>Responsible:    freebsd-bugs
>State:          open
>Quarter:        
>Keywords:       
>Date-Required:
>Class:          change-request
>Submitter-Id:   current-users
>Arrival-Date:   Sat Mar 09 23:20:01 PST 2002
>Closed-Date:
>Last-Modified:
>Originator:     Gary W. Swearingen
>Release:        FreeBSD 4.5-STABLE i386
>Organization:
none
>Environment:
n/a
================
>Description:

The man(1) program apparently extracts the ".Dd" date from the page
source and displays it in the footer.  Sometimes (when .Dd is not
used?) the date in the footer is very recent, but very often, the date
in the footer is very ancient, giving the (usually!) false impression
to new ("potential old") users that the man pages are poorly maintained
and tending to encourage the perception that FreeBSD (and other BSD
OSes) are ancient and obsolecent.

Marketing considerations are important and good for FreeBSD, like it or
not.

I propose simply removing the dates from the footer.  The very few who
care what that "document date" is/was may look in the source.  Note that
many man pages rightfully put similar old dates in a "History" section.

Alternatively, and more work, some automated means to insert the man
page release date (or even the last modification date -- an actually
useful date) could be implemented.

I know this is a low probability change-request/wish, but it's long
bugged me and I thought I should put it "out there" for consideration.
================
>How-To-Repeat:
n/a
================
>Fix:
?
>Release-Note:
>Audit-Trail:
>Unformatted:

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