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While searching for informations about Git commands in the documentation, I noticed some commands has been named with (1) (git(1), git-checkout(1), git-reset(1)) and some with (7) (gittutorial(7))

Does it correspond to the number of possible parameter ?

Thanks

towane
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4 Answers4

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It's the type of man page. man's manuals are split into several sections, chapter 1 is for executables, and git is an executable. The whole list is given by man man:

1   Executable programs or shell commands
2   System calls (functions provided by the kernel)
3   Library calls (functions within program libraries)
4   Special files (usually found in /dev)
5   File formats and conventions eg /etc/passwd
6   Games
7   Miscellaneous (including macro packages and conventions), e.g. man(7), groff(7)
8   System administration commands (usually only for root)
9   Kernel routines [Non standard]

Some things are in multiple sections, like time is both a command and a system call, see the difference between man 1 time and man 2 time.

RemcoGerlich
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The numbers means manual (man) section. Each manual is assigned to some section. For example section 1 is for common programs, section 3 for C language functions.

user2699113
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Not really. The number is just an indication of what man page section the command is documented in.

You can find more information here: http://www.unix.com/man-page/Linux/1/man/

Nuno Guerreiro
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There are several "sections" in the *man*ual. A keyword like 'git' or 'read' can refer to many things. For example, read can be a bash script function, an executable, a C function, etc. So, you'd find in the man some entries like read(A), read(B), read(C), where the A/B/C numbers would relate to sections about bash, utils and C library.

quetzalcoatl
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