Install and Use pinfo for Colorful Info Pages on Linux/Unix

pinfo is a little‑known command‑line tool that renders Texinfo documentation with colors, making it handy when a graphical environment is unavailable.

Installation

Debian/Ubuntu : # apt-get install pinfo Sample output shows the package being fetched and installed.

FreeBSD (ports):

# cd /usr/ports/misc/pinfo && make install clean

Or using the binary package manager: # sudo pkg install pinfo CentOS/RHEL 8.x and Fedora : # sudo dnf install pinfo Arch Linux : # sudo pacman -S pinfo OpenSUSE / SUSE Enterprise : # sudo zypper in pinfo macOS (requires Homebrew):

# brew install pinfo

Using pinfo

The basic syntax is:

pinfo page
pinfo command

For example, to view the Bash info page with colors:

# info bash

Now display it with pinfo:

# pinfo bash

To create a shortcut, add an alias to ~/.bashrc:

alias info='pinfo'

Navigation keys

N – go to the next page

P – go to the previous page

U – return to the last visited page

Press Enter on a cross‑reference (words starting with *) to follow it

Q – quit pinfo

Conclusion

For users of Linux, FreeBSD and other Unix‑like systems, pinfo provides a friendly, console‑based viewer for Info documentation with many options; see its man page for further details.