6 Nodes

Nodes are the primary segments of a Texinfo file. They do not in and of themselves impose a hierarchical or any other kind of structure on a file. Nodes contain node pointers that name other nodes, and can contain menus which are lists of nodes. In Info, the movement commands can carry you to a pointed-to node or to a node listed in a menu.

Node pointers and menus provide structure for Info files just as chapters, sections, subsections, and the like provide structure for printed books. The two structures are theoretically distinct. In practice, however, the tree structure of printed books is essentially always used for the node and menu structure also, as this leads to a document which is easiest to follow. See Texinfo Document Structure.

Because node names are used in cross references, it is not desirable to casually change them once published. Such name changes invalidate references from other manuals, from mail archives, and so on. See HTML Xref Link Preservation.