xref: /netbsd-src/usr.bin/hexdump/hexdump.1 (revision de4fa6c51a9708fc05f88b618fa6fad87c9508ec)
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30.\"	from: @(#)hexdump.1	8.2 (Berkeley) 4/18/94
31.\"
32.Dd April 18, 1994
33.Dt HEXDUMP 1
34.Os
35.Sh NAME
36.Nm hexdump
37.Nd ascii, decimal, hexadecimal, octal dump
38.Sh SYNOPSIS
39.Nm
40.Op Fl bcCdovx
41.Bk -words
42.Op Fl e Ar format_string
43.Ek
44.Bk -words
45.Op Fl f Ar format_file
46.Ek
47.Bk -words
48.Op Fl n Ar length
49.Ek
50.Bk -words
51.Op Fl s Ar skip
52.Ek
53.Ar file ...
54.Sh DESCRIPTION
55The hexdump utility is a filter which displays the specified files, or
56the standard input, if no files are specified, in a user specified
57format.
58.Pp
59The options are as follows:
60.Bl -tag -width Fl
61.It Fl b
62.Em One-byte octal display .
63Display the input offset in hexadecimal, followed by sixteen
64space-separated, three column, zero-filled, bytes of input data,
65in octal, per line.
66.It Fl c
67.Em One-byte character display .
68Display the input offset in hexadecimal, followed by sixteen
69space-separated, three column, space-filled, characters of input
70data per line.
71.It Fl C
72.Em Canonical hex+ASCII display .
73Display the input offset in hexadecimal, followed by sixteen
74space-separated, two column, hexadecimal bytes, followed by the
75same sixteen bytes in %_p format enclosed in ``|'' characters.
76.It Fl d
77.Em Two-byte decimal display .
78Display the input offset in hexadecimal, followed by eight
79space-separated, five column, zero-filled, two-byte units
80of input data, in unsigned decimal, per line.
81.It Fl e Ar format_string
82Specify a format string to be used for displaying data.
83.It Fl f Ar format_file
84Specify a file that contains one or more newline separated format strings.
85Empty lines and lines whose first non-blank character is a hash mark
86.Pf ( Cm \&# )
87are ignored.
88.It Fl n Ar length
89Interpret only
90.Ar length
91bytes of input.
92.It Fl o
93.Em Two-byte octal display .
94Display the input offset in hexadecimal, followed by eight
95space-separated, six column, zero-filled, two byte quantities of
96input data, in octal, per line.
97.It Fl s Ar offset
98Skip
99.Ar offset
100bytes from the beginning of the input.
101By default,
102.Ar offset
103is interpreted as a decimal number.
104With a leading
105.Cm 0x
106or
107.Cm 0X ,
108.Ar offset
109is interpreted as a hexadecimal number,
110otherwise, with a leading
111.Cm 0 ,
112.Ar offset
113is interpreted as an octal number.
114Appending the character
115.Cm b ,
116.Cm k ,
117or
118.Cm m
119to
120.Ar offset
121causes it to be interpreted as a multiple of
122.Li 512 ,
123.Li 1024 ,
124or
125.Li 1048576 ,
126respectively.
127.It Fl v
128The
129.Fl v
130option causes hexdump to display all input data.
131Without the
132.Fl v
133option, any number of groups of output lines, which would be
134identical to the immediately preceding group of output lines (except
135for the input offsets), are replaced with a line containing a
136single asterisk.
137.It Fl x
138.Em Two-byte hexadecimal display .
139Display the input offset in hexadecimal, followed by eight, space
140separated, four column, zero-filled, two-byte quantities of input
141data, in hexadecimal, per line.
142.El
143.Pp
144For each input file,
145.Nm
146sequentially copies the input to standard output, transforming the
147data according to the format strings specified by the
148.Fl e
149and
150.Fl f
151options, in the order that they were specified.
152.Ss Formats
153A format string contains any number of format units, separated by
154whitespace.
155A format unit contains up to three items: an iteration count, a byte
156count, and a format.
157.Pp
158The iteration count is an optional positive integer, which defaults to
159one.
160Each format is applied iteration count times.
161.Pp
162The byte count is an optional positive integer.
163If specified it defines the number of bytes to be interpreted by
164each iteration of the format.
165.Pp
166If an iteration count and/or a byte count is specified, a single slash
167must be placed after the iteration count and/or before the byte count
168to disambiguate them.
169Any whitespace before or after the slash is ignored.
170.Pp
171The format is required and must be surrounded by double quote
172(" ") marks.
173It is interpreted as a fprintf-style format string (see
174.Xr fprintf 3 ) ,
175with the
176following exceptions:
177.Bl -bullet -offset indent
178.It
179An asterisk (*) may not be used as a field width or precision.
180.It
181A byte count or field precision
182.Em is
183required for each ``s'' conversion
184character (unlike the
185.Xr fprintf 3
186default which prints the entire string if the precision is unspecified).
187.It
188The conversion characters ``h'', ``l'', ``n'', ``p'' and ``q'' are
189not supported.
190.It
191The single character escape sequences
192described in the C standard are supported:
193.Bd -ragged -offset indent -compact
194.Bl -column \*[Lt]alert_character\*[Gt]
195.It NUL	\e0
196.It \*[Lt]alert character\*[Gt]	\ea
197.It \*[Lt]backspace\*[Gt]	\eb
198.It \*[Lt]form-feed\*[Gt]	\ef
199.It \*[Lt]newline\*[Gt]	\en
200.It \*[Lt]carriage return\*[Gt]	\er
201.It \*[Lt]tab\*[Gt]	\et
202.It \*[Lt]vertical tab\*[Gt]	\ev
203.El
204.Ed
205.El
206.Pp
207Hexdump also supports the following additional conversion strings:
208.Bl -tag -width Fl
209.It Cm \&_a Ns Op Cm dox
210Display the input offset, cumulative across input files, of the
211next byte to be displayed.
212The appended characters
213.Cm d ,
214.Cm o ,
215and
216.Cm x
217specify the display base
218as decimal, octal or hexadecimal respectively.
219.It Cm \&_A Ns Op Cm dox
220Identical to the
221.Cm \&_a
222conversion string except that it is only performed
223once, when all of the input data has been processed.
224.It Cm \&_c
225Output characters in the default character set.
226Nonprinting characters are displayed in three character, zero-padded
227octal, except for those representable by standard escape notation
228(see above),
229which are displayed as two character strings.
230.It Cm _p
231Output characters in the default character set.
232Nonprinting characters are displayed as a single
233.Dq Cm \&. .
234.It Cm _u
235Output US ASCII characters, with the exception that control characters are
236displayed using the following, lower-case, names.
237Characters greater than 0xff, hexadecimal, are displayed as hexadecimal
238strings.
239.Bl -column \&000_nu \&001_so \&002_st \&003_et \&004_eo
240.It \&000\ nul\t001\ soh\t002\ stx\t003\ etx\t004\ eot\t005\ enq
241.It \&006\ ack\t007\ bel\t008\ bs\t009\ ht\t00A\ lf\t00B\ vt
242.It \&00C\ ff\t00D\ cr\t00E\ so\t00F\ si\t010\ dle\t011\ dc1
243.It \&012\ dc2\t013\ dc3\t014\ dc4\t015\ nak\t016\ syn\t017\ etb
244.It \&018\ can\t019\ em\t01A\ sub\t01B\ esc\t01C\ fs\t01D\ gs
245.It \&01E\ rs\t01F\ us\t0FF\ del
246.El
247.El
248.Pp
249The default and supported byte counts for the conversion characters
250are as follows:
251.Bl -tag -width  "Xc,_Xc,_Xc,_Xc,_Xc,_Xc" -offset indent
252.It Li \&%_c , \&%_p , \&%_u , \&%c
253One byte counts only.
254.It Xo
255.Li \&%d , \&%i , \&%o , \&%u , \&%X , \&%x
256.Xc
257Four byte default, one, two, four and eight byte counts supported.
258.It Xo
259.Li \&%E , \&%e , \&%f , \&%G , \&%g
260.Xc
261Eight byte default, four byte counts supported.
262.El
263.Pp
264The amount of data interpreted by each format string is the sum of the
265data required by each format unit, which is the iteration count times the
266byte count, or the iteration count times the number of bytes required by
267the format if the byte count is not specified.
268.Pp
269The input is manipulated in ``blocks'', where a block is defined as the
270largest amount of data specified by any format string.
271Format strings interpreting less than an input block's worth of data,
272whose last format unit both interprets some number of bytes and does
273not have a specified iteration count, have the iteration count
274incremented until the entire input block has been processed or there
275is not enough data remaining in the block to satisfy the format string.
276.Pp
277If, either as a result of user specification or hexdump modifying
278the iteration count as described above, an iteration count is
279greater than one, no trailing whitespace characters are output
280during the last iteration.
281.Pp
282It is an error to specify a byte count as well as multiple conversion
283characters or strings unless all but one of the conversion characters
284or strings is
285.Cm \&_a
286or
287.Cm \&_A .
288.Pp
289If, as a result of the specification of the
290.Fl n
291option or end-of-file being reached, input data only partially
292satisfies a format string, the input block is zero-padded sufficiently
293to display all available data (i.e. any format units overlapping the
294end of data will display some number of the zero bytes).
295.Pp
296Further output by such format strings is replaced by an equivalent
297number of spaces.
298An equivalent number of spaces is defined as the number of spaces
299output by an
300.Cm s
301conversion character with the same field width
302and precision as the original conversion character or conversion
303string but with any
304.Dq Li \&+ ,
305.Dq \&\ \& ,
306.Dq Li \&#
307conversion flag characters
308removed, and referencing a NULL string.
309.Pp
310If no format strings are specified, the default display is equivalent
311to specifying the
312.Fl x
313option.
314.Pp
315.Nm
316exits 0 on success and \*[Gt]0 if an error occurred.
317.Sh EXAMPLES
318Display the input in perusal format:
319.Bd -literal -offset indent
320"%06.6_ao "  12/1 "%3_u "
321"\et\et" "%_p "
322"\en"
323.Ed
324.Pp
325Implement the \-x option:
326.Bd -literal -offset indent
327"%07.7_Ax\en"
328"%07.7_ax  " 8/2 "%04x " "\en"
329.Ed
330