[pricci]

I'm aware of apropos, but I usually forget how the command is named.

edit: I forget how apropos is named.

[kroltan]

    alias halp=apropos

[RobertMiller]

I used to have a hard time remembering apropos because I assumed 'apropos' was some sort of unixy mincing of another word or abbreviation or something, and I couldn't figure out what it meant. You know, like 'mkdir' means "MaKe DIRectory"

But it turns out apropos is just a regular word. Once I learned this, I haven't had any more trouble with it.

apropos : Of an appropriate or pertinent nature.

https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/apropos

[zfxfr]

Ohh I always thought "apropos" was from the French expression "à propos (de)... " which means "about". I naïvely believed that the person who coded this command must be French.

[killerbat00]

The English usage is borrowed from French![0] However, it doesn't look like the original author was French[1]. I shouldn't be, but I am quite surprised to see that the apropos command as we know it is 43 years old!

[0] https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/apropos [1] https://www.mankier.com/1/apropos.mandoc#History

[ochrist]

It's an ordinary word in Danish, meaning 'about something'. It can be used at the start of a sentence. Example: "Apropos vegetables I hate tomatoes".

[Isamu]

You are correct about the origin except it came from French into English long ago.

[paskozdilar]

Which is exactly the use case for apropos, which searches "the manual page names and descriptions"[0] for whatever term you've entered.

[0] https://man7.org/linux/man-pages/man1/apropos.1.html