Why? Manuals come in different levels, not all of them are tutorials/guides, some of them are references. We still call them manuals.

> For example try to figure out how to extract a zip using tar by using the man-pages.

I'm not sure if you're purposefully mixing tars/zips here, I'm gonna assume you mean a "tar-file" instead of "zip" as obviously tar can't unzip a zip file.

Not sure why you're having troubles finding the instructions compared to the thousands of people who managed to find it. Just to refresh my memory (although I know the commands by heart by now), I gave it a try.

1. `man tar`

3. Read through the synopsis, realize I need to specify the archive file with `-f`.

2. Synopsis didn't mention extract, so I search for `extract` as I know I want to extract a file

3. Now I have `tar xf $archive.tar` and I run that. Notice I would like to have some output.

4. Go back to manpages, search for "output" and find the "-v" flag

5. Final command I'm happy with is `tar xfv $archive.tar`

Is that really so difficult? Has the internet ruined peoples ability to search for information themselves and playing around?

Btw, assuming you meant a gzipped tar, it's tar xvfz (mnemonic: XaVier FugaZi), I can remember from memory solely because of good old RTFM and no hand-holding.

Your mileage might vary, but to put it very frankly (and obtusely): if you can't be bothered to learn why should anyone help you, for free?