1.\" $NetBSD: xargs.1,v 1.6 1994/11/14 06:51:40 jtc Exp $ 2.\" 3.\" Copyright (c) 1990, 1991, 1993 4.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. 5.\" 6.\" This code is derived from software contributed to Berkeley by 7.\" John B. Roll Jr. and the Institute of Electrical and Electronics 8.\" Engineers, Inc. 9.\" 10.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 11.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 12.\" are met: 13.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 14.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 15.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 16.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 17.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 18.\" 3. All advertising materials mentioning features or use of this software 19.\" must display the following acknowledgement: 20.\" This product includes software developed by the University of 21.\" California, Berkeley and its contributors. 22.\" 4. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors 23.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software 24.\" without specific prior written permission. 25.\" 26.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 27.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 28.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 29.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 30.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 31.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 32.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 33.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 34.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 35.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 36.\" SUCH DAMAGE. 37.\" 38.\" @(#)xargs.1 8.1 (Berkeley) 6/6/93 39.\" 40.Dd June 6, 1993 41.Dt XARGS 1 42.Os 43.Sh NAME 44.Nm xargs 45.Nd "construct argument list(s) and execute utility" 46.Sh SYNOPSIS 47.Nm xargs 48.Op Fl t 49.Oo Op Fl x 50.Fl n Ar number 51.Oc 52.Op Fl s Ar size 53.Op Ar utility Op Ar arguments ... 54.Sh DESCRIPTION 55The 56.Nm xargs 57utility reads space, tab, newline and end-of-file delimited arguments 58from the standard input and executes the specified 59.Ar utility 60with them as 61arguments. 62.Pp 63The utility and any arguments specified on the command line are given 64to the 65.Ar utility 66upon each invocation, followed by some number of the arguments read 67from standard input. 68The 69.Ar utility 70is repeatedly executed until standard input is exhausted. 71.Pp 72Spaces, tabs and newlines may be embedded in arguments using single 73(``\ '\ '') 74.Ek 75or double (``"'') quotes or backslashes (``\e''). 76Single quotes escape all non-single quote characters, excluding newlines, 77up to the matching single quote. 78Double quotes escape all non-double quote characters, excluding newlines, 79up to the matching double quote. 80Any single character, including newlines, may be escaped by a backslash. 81.Pp 82The options are as follows: 83.Bl -tag -width indent 84.It Fl n Ar number 85Set the maximum number of arguments taken from standard input for each 86invocation of the utility. 87An invocation of 88.Ar utility 89will use less than 90.Ar number 91standard input arguments if the number of bytes accumulated (see the 92.Fl s 93option) exceeds the specified 94.Ar size 95or there are fewer than 96.Ar number 97arguments remaining for the last invocation of 98.Ar utility . 99The current default value for 100.Ar number 101is 5000. 102.It Fl s Ar size 103Set the maximum number of bytes for the command line length provided to 104.Ar utility . 105The sum of the length of the utility name and the arguments passed to 106.Ar utility 107(including 108.Dv NULL 109terminators) will be less than or equal to this number. 110The current default value for 111.Ar size 112is 113.Dv ARG_MAX 114- 2048. 115.It Fl t 116Echo the command to be executed to standard error immediately before it 117is executed. 118.It Fl x 119Force 120.Nm xargs 121to terminate immediately if a command line containing 122.Ar number 123arguments will not fit in the specified (or default) command line length. 124.El 125.Pp 126If no 127.Ar utility 128is specified, 129.Xr echo 1 130is used. 131.Pp 132Undefined behavior may occur if 133.Ar utility 134reads from the standard input. 135.Pp 136The 137.Nm xargs 138utility exits immediately (without processing any further input) if a 139command line cannot be assembled, 140.Ar utility 141cannot be invoked, an invocation of the utility is terminated by a signal 142or an invocation of the utility exits with a value of 255. 143.Sh DIAGNOSTICS 144.Nm xargs 145exits with one of the following values: 146.Bl -tag -width Ds -compact 147.It 0 148All invocations of 149.Ar utility 150returned a zero exit status. 151.It 123 152One or more invocations of 153.Ar utility 154returned a nonzero exit status. 155.It 124 156The 157.Ar utility 158exited with a 255 exit status. 159.It 125 160The 161.Ar utility 162was killed or stopped by a signal. 163.It 126 164The 165.Ar utility 166was found but could not be invoked. 167.It 127 168The 169.Ar utility 170could not be found. 171.It 1 172Some other error occurred. 173.El 174.Sh SEE ALSO 175.Xr echo 1 , 176.Xr find 1 177.Sh STANDARDS 178The 179.Nm xargs 180utility is expected to be 181.St -p1003.2 182compliant. 183.Sh HISTORY 184The meaning of 123, 124, and 125 exit values were taken from GNU xargs. 185