---
name: "perldoc"
section: "1p"
platform: "linux"
package: "perl"
version: "5.004.04-7.0.1"
release: "Debian 2.1 (Slink)"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/perldoc/1p"
---

# perldoc(1p)

Look up Perl documentation in pod format.

## NAME

perldoc - Look up Perl documentation in pod format.

## SYNOPSIS

**perldoc** \[**-h**\] \[**-v**\] \[**-t**\] \[**-u**\] \[**-m**\] \[**-l**\] PageName⎪ModuleName⎪ProgramName

**perldoc** **-f** BuiltinFunction

## DESCRIPTION

*perldoc* looks up a piece of documentation in .pod format that is embedded in the perl installation tree or in a perl script, and displays it via `pod2man ⎪ nroff -man ⎪ $PAGER`. (In addition, if running under HP-UX, `col -x` will be used.) This is primarily used for the documentation for the perl library modules.

Your system may also have man pages installed for those modules, in which case you can probably just use the [*man*(1)](/man/1.md) command.

## OPTIONS

- **-h** help

  Prints out a brief help message.\

- **-v** verbose

  Describes search for the item in detail.\

- **-t** text output

  Display docs using plain text converter, instead of nroff. This may be faster, but it won't look as nice.\

- **-u** unformatted

  Find docs only; skip reformatting by pod2\*\

- **-m** module

  Display the entire module: both code and unformatted pod documentation. This may be useful if the docs don't explain a function in the detail you need, and you'd like to inspect the code directly; perldoc will find the file for you and simply hand it off for display.\

- **-l** file name only

  Display the file name of the module found.\

- **-f** perlfunc

  The **-f** option followed by the name of a perl built in function will extract the documentation of this function from the *perlfunc* manpage.\

- **PageName\|ModuleName\|ProgramName**

  The item you want to look up.  Nested modules (such as `File::Basename`) are specified either as `File::Basename` or `File/Basename`.  You may also give a descriptive name of a page, such as `perlfunc`. You make also give a partial or wrong-case name, such as "basename" for "File::Basename", but this will be slower, if there is more then one page with the same partial name, you will only get the first one.

## ENVIRONMENT

Any switches in the `PERLDOC` environment variable will be used before the  command line arguments.  `perldoc` also searches directories specified by the `PERL5LIB` (or `PERLLIB` if `PERL5LIB` is not defined) and `PATH` environment variables. (The latter is so that embedded pods for executables, such as `perldoc` itself, are available.)

## AUTHOR

Kenneth Albanowski \<kjahds@kjahds.com\>

Minor updates by Andy Dougherty \<doughera@lafcol.lafayette.edu\>