About This Handbook

This handbook is not an extensive guide on how to use and configure common Linux software. The purpose of this document is to explain how to install, configure, and maintain Void Linux systems, and to highlight the differences between common Linux distributions and Void.

To search for a particular term within the Handbook, select the 'magnifying glass' icon, or press 's'.

Those looking for tips and tricks on how to configure a Linux system in general should consult upstream software documentation. Additionally, the Arch Wiki provides a fairly comprehensive outline of common Linux software configuration, and a variety of internet search engines are available for further assistance.

Reading The Manuals

While this handbook does not provide a large amount of copy and paste configuration instructions, it does provide links to the man pages for the referenced software wherever possible.

To learn how to use the man(1) man page viewer, run the command man man. It can be configured by editing /etc/man.conf; read man.conf(5) for details.

Void uses the mandoc toolset for man pages. mandoc was formerly known as "mdocml", and is provided by the mdocml package.

Example Commands

Examples in this guide may have snippets of commands to be run in your shell. When you see these, any line beginning with $ is run as your normal user. Lines beginning with # are run as root. After either of these lines, there may be example output from the command.

Placeholders

Some examples include text with placeholders. Placeholders indicate where you should substitute the appropriate information. For example:

# ln -s /etc/sv/<service_name> /var/service/

This means you need to substitute the text <service_name> with the actual service name.