How to get 'man' working in an Alpine Linux Docker container?

You need to add

apk add mdocml-apropos

and then for each package you need the man packages for

apk add curl-doc

and you are set to go to use man after, like you already did

apk add man man-pages mdocml-apropos

The source for this (plus added the mdocml-apropos which is missing there) is https://wiki.alpinelinux.org/wiki/Alpine_Linux:FAQ#Why_don.27t_I_have_man_pages_or_where_is_the_.27man.27_command.3F but interstingly, i cannot get it working myself.

Also tried to export TERM=xterm to see if thats in iteractivity issue but it is not.

Also tried makewhatis /usr/share/man manually, but no sucess.

Interestingly though:

ls  -la /usr/share/man/man1/curl-config.1.gz-rw-r--r--    1 root     root          1687 Aug  4 15:07 /usr/share/man/man1/curl-config.1.gz

So there is a manpage

For me, to get rid of this error:

man manmore: -s: No such file or directory

I use:

export PAGER=less

then it works

In fact, this has to do with the way you are connected to the container. I'm using alpine a lot with LXD, and generally can't read any man page when connected via lxc exec container ash. I suppose docker connect you to the container the same way.

$ lxc exec alp03 ash~ # man manmore: -s: No such file or directory

So you can use su -, and then you will be able to use man:

~ # su -alp03:~# man manMAN(1P)                    POSIX Programmer's Manual(...)

Note how the prompt is different after the su - command.

Also, if I run a ssh server inside the container and then connect to this container via ssh, then man is working perfectly.