How To Display Color Man Pages in Linux and Unix

To display color man pages in Linux and Unix, you can use the less command with the -R option.

For example, to display the man page for the ls command in color, you can use the following command:

man -R ls

This will display the man page for ls in color, using the less command as the pager.

You can also set the MANPAGER environment variable to use less with the -R option as the default pager for man pages.

For example:

export MANPAGER="less -R"

This will set less with the -R option as the default pager for man pages.

You can also set the LESS environment variable to enable color output for less.

For example:

export LESS="-R"

This will enable color output for less.

Keep in mind that the color output for man pages may not be available on all systems, depending on the configuration of the system and the version of the less command.

Note: The man command is used to display the documentation (man pages) for Unix and Linux commands. Man pages are organized into sections, and each man page belongs to a specific section. The man command can be used to display the man page for a specific command by specifying the command name and the section number (optional). For example, man ls will display the man page for the ls command, and man 2 ls will display the man page for the ls command in section 2 (system calls).