Your question isn't clear but maybe this is what you want as it looks like what you posted as expected output?
$ man ls | awk -v RS= '/^(NAME|DESCRIPTION)/'
NAME
ls - list directory contents
DESCRIPTION
List information about the FILEs (the current directory by default). Sort entries alphabetically if none
of -cftuvSUX nor --sort is specified.
but you say you want the full DESCRIPTION so then that'd be:
$ man ls | awk '
/^[[:alnum:]]/{ prt(); rec="" }
{ rec = rec $0 ORS }
END { prt() }
function prt() {
gsub(/^[[:space:]]+|[[:space:]]+$/,"",rec)
if ( rec ~ /^(NAME|DESCRIPTION)/ ) {
print rec
}
}
'
NAME
ls - list directory contents
DESCRIPTION
List information about the FILEs (the current directory by default). Sort entries alphabetically if none
of -cftuvSUX nor --sort is specified.
Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short options too.
-a, --all
do not ignore entries starting with .
-A, --almost-all
do not list implied . and ..
--author
with -l, print the author of each file
-b, --escape
print C-style escapes for nongraphic characters
--block-size=SIZE
with -l, scale sizes by SIZE when printing them; e.g., '--block-size=M'; see SIZE format below
-B, --ignore-backups
do not list implied entries ending with ~
-c with -lt: sort by, and show, ctime (time of last modification of file status information); with -l:
show ctime and sort by name; otherwise: sort by ctime, newest first
-C list entries by columns
--color[=WHEN]
colorize the output; WHEN can be 'always' (default if omitted), 'auto', or 'never'; more info below
-d, --directory
list directories themselves, not their contents
-D, --dired
generate output designed for Emacs' dired mode
-f list all entries in directory order
-F, --classify[=WHEN]
append indicator (one of */=>@|) to entries; WHEN can be 'always' (default if omitted), 'auto', or
'never'
--file-type
likewise, except do not append '*'
--format=WORD
across -x, commas -m, horizontal -x, long -l, single-column -1, verbose -l, vertical -C
--full-time
like -l --time-style=full-iso
-g like -l, but do not list owner
--group-directories-first
group directories before files;
can be augmented with a --sort option, but any use of --sort=none (-U) disables grouping
-G, --no-group
in a long listing, don't print group names
-h, --human-readable
with -l and -s, print sizes like 1K 234M 2G etc.
--si likewise, but use powers of 1000 not 1024
-H, --dereference-command-line
follow symbolic links listed on the command line
--dereference-command-line-symlink-to-dir
follow each command line symbolic link
that points to a directory
--hide=PATTERN
do not list implied entries matching shell PATTERN (overridden by -a or -A)
--hyperlink[=WHEN]
hyperlink file names; WHEN can be 'always' (default if omitted), 'auto', or 'never'
--indicator-style=WORD
append indicator with style WORD to entry names: none (default), slash (-p), file-type
(--file-type), classify (-F)
-i, --inode
print the index number of each file
-I, --ignore=PATTERN
do not list implied entries matching shell PATTERN
-k, --kibibytes
default to 1024-byte blocks for file system usage; used only with -s and per directory totals
-l use a long listing format
-L, --dereference
when showing file information for a symbolic link, show information for the file the link references
rather than for the link itself
-m fill width with a comma separated list of entries
-n, --numeric-uid-gid
like -l, but list numeric user and group IDs
-N, --literal
print entry names without quoting
-o like -l, but do not list group information
-p, --indicator-style=slash
append / indicator to directories
-q, --hide-control-chars
print ? instead of nongraphic characters
--show-control-chars
show nongraphic characters as-is (the default, unless program is 'ls' and output is a terminal)
-Q, --quote-name
enclose entry names in double quotes
--quoting-style=WORD
use quoting style WORD for entry names: literal, locale, shell, shell-always, shell-escape,
shell-escape-always, c, escape (overrides QUOTING_STYLE environment variable)
-r, --reverse
reverse order while sorting
-R, --recursive
list subdirectories recursively
-s, --size
print the allocated size of each file, in blocks
-S sort by file size, largest first
--sort=WORD
sort by WORD instead of name: none (-U), size (-S), time (-t), version (-v), extension (-X), width
--time=WORD
change the default of using modification times; access time (-u): atime, access, use; change time
(-c): ctime, status; birth time: birth, creation;
with -l, WORD determines which time to show; with --sort=time, sort by WORD (newest first)
--time-style=TIME_STYLE
time/date format with -l; see TIME_STYLE below
-t sort by time, newest first; see --time
-T, --tabsize=COLS
assume tab stops at each COLS instead of 8
-u with -lt: sort by, and show, access time; with -l: show access time and sort by name; otherwise:
sort by access time, newest first
-U do not sort; list entries in directory order
-v natural sort of (version) numbers within text
-w, --width=COLS
set output width to COLS. 0 means no limit
-x list entries by lines instead of by columns
-X sort alphabetically by entry extension
-Z, --context
print any security context of each file
--zero end each output line with NUL, not newline
-1 list one file per line
--append-exe
append .exe if cygwin magic was needed
--help display this help and exit
--version
output version information and exit
The SIZE argument is an integer and optional unit (example: 10K is 10*1024). Units are K,M,G,T,P,E,Z,Y
(powers of 1024) or KB,MB,... (powers of 1000). Binary prefixes can be used, too: KiB=K, MiB=M, and so on.
The TIME_STYLE argument can be full-iso, long-iso, iso, locale, or +FORMAT. FORMAT is interpreted like in
date(1). If FORMAT is FORMAT1<newline>FORMAT2, then FORMAT1 applies to non-recent files and FORMAT2 to re‐
cent files. TIME_STYLE prefixed with 'posix-' takes effect only outside the POSIX locale. Also the
TIME_STYLE environment variable sets the default style to use.
Using color to distinguish file types is disabled both by default and with --color=never. With
--color=auto, ls emits color codes only when standard output is connected to a terminal. The LS_COLORS en‐
vironment variable can change the settings. Use the dircolors command to set it.
Exit status:
0 if OK,
1 if minor problems (e.g., cannot access subdirectory),
2 if serious trouble (e.g., cannot access command-line argument).
