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How do I print out a Linux man or info page?

Posted by Vivek Gite [Last updated: April 16, 2008]

Some time it is necessary to print a Linux man or info page. To print a ls command man page on command line type following command:

$ man ls | col -b | lpr -P hp1_floor2

Where,
col -b : To format man page output, it will not show any special character such as backspaces
lpr -P hp1_floor2 : hp1_floor2 is the printer name of the Linux/UNIX printer queue

To print the man page with effects such as italic and bold fonts on HP Laser Jet printer:
$ zcat /usr/share/man/man1/ls.1.gz | groff -man -Tps | lpr -P hp1_floor2

Or save man page as ps file:
zcat /usr/share/man/man1/ls.1.gz | groff -man -Tps >top.ps

Where,
zcat : Open compress /usr/share/man/man1/ls.1.gz file
groff : Go through groff document formatting system, which is responsible for formatting of man page with ffects such as italic and bold fonts on both screen and printer
lpr -P hp1_floor2 : hp1_floor2 is the printer name of the Linux/UNIX printer queue

Here is a shell script that we have installed on all Linux workstations, it saves man page in a text file and later user can print it using lpr command.

#!/bin/bash
# Linux shell script to save man pages to text file
# so that later user can print them
CMDS="$@"
OUTDIR="/tmp/$USER.man"
[ ! -d $OUTDIR ] && mkdir -p $OUTDIR  :
for i in $CMDS
do
 man $i  col -b > $OUTDIR/$i.txt
done
echo "**********************************************************"
echo "All man pages saved to $OUTDIR directory"
echo "Just goto \"$OUTDIR\" directory and type following command
to print page:"
echo "lpr *.txt"
echo "**********************************************************"
exit 0
 

Just type the script-name followed by Linux commands, for example to print a man page of ls and bash type
$ saveman "ls bash"

Related: How do I print or make hard copies of Linux man and info pages?

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