Description:

This request is being filed at the suggestion of Allan (https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?pid=1330806#p1330806) following my suggestion in that thread (https://bbs.archlinux.org/viewtopic.php?pid=1330801#p1330801).

It would be helpful if the output from pacman -h could say a couple of words about what each operation is for. For example, for -Q it isn't obvious that "query" means locally installed packages and not the database of available packages. This is obvious when you look at the expanded help with -Qh but you need to know it is -Q you want first. Similarly, it is not at all obvious that "sync" is the right operation if I want to search for a package.

I think the more detailed help (pacman -{Q,S,D,R,U,T}h) is really clear but the initial help from pacman -h could be slightly more informative. Obviously the man page covers this in great detail but for a quick reminder for people getting used to the flags, I think just a couple of words explaining each operation would be really helpful.

Here is some suggested wording (which I'm sure could be improved). I'm sorry I couldn't figure out how to put this into the functions in pacman.c to provide a patch:

usage: pacman <operation> [...]
operations:
pacman {-h --help}
pacman {-V --version}
pacman {-D --database} <options> <package(s)> modify database of installed packages
pacman {-Q --query} [options] [package(s)] query database of installed packages
pacman {-R --remove} [options] <package(s)> remove or uninstall packages
pacman {-S --sync} [options] [package(s)] search or update database of available packages
install or update packages
pacman {-T --deptest} [options] [package(s)] check dependencies
pacman {-U --upgrade} [options] <file(s)> install or update packages from local files

use 'pacman {-h --help}' with an operation for available options