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Annotation of researchv10dc/man/mana/xargs.1, revision 1.1

1.1     ! root        1: .TH XARGS 1
        !             2: .SH NAME
        !             3: xargs \- construct argument lists and execute command
        !             4: .SH SYNOPSIS
        !             5: .B xargs
        !             6: [
        !             7: .I option
        !             8: ]
        !             9: [
        !            10: .I command
        !            11: [
        !            12: .I initial-arguments
        !            13: ]
        !            14: ]
        !            15: .SH DESCRIPTION
        !            16: .I Xargs\^
        !            17: combines the fixed
        !            18: .I initial-arguments\^
        !            19: with arguments read from standard input to execute the specified
        !            20: .I command\^
        !            21: one or more times.
        !            22: .IR Command
        !            23: .RF ( /bin/echo
        !            24: by default)
        !            25: is located according to environment variable
        !            26: .LR PATH .
        !            27: .PP
        !            28: Arguments read from standard input are delimited by
        !            29: white space (blanks, tabs, or new-lines).
        !            30: However, single or double quotes may be used to
        !            31: surround arguments that contain blanks or tabs, and
        !            32: backslash
        !            33: .L \e
        !            34: may be used to quote single characters outside of quotes.
        !            35: .PP
        !            36: Normally the
        !            37: .I initial-arguments\^
        !            38: are followed by arguments read from standard input until an internal buffer is full, whereupon
        !            39: .I command\^
        !            40: is executed with the accumulated arguments.
        !            41: This process is repeated
        !            42: until there are no more arguments.
        !            43: Options modify this rule:
        !            44: .TP
        !            45: .BI \-l n\^
        !            46: .I Command\^
        !            47: is executed upon reading each
        !            48: .I n\^
        !            49: (default 1)
        !            50: nonempty lines from standard input.
        !            51: Newlines preceded by blank or tab are not counted.
        !            52: Option
        !            53: .B \-x
        !            54: is implied.
        !            55: .TP
        !            56: .BI \-i s\^
        !            57: Insert mode:
        !            58: .I command\^
        !            59: is executed for each line from standard input,
        !            60: taking the entire line as a single arg, inserting it in
        !            61: .I initial-arguments\^
        !            62: for each occurrence of
        !            63: .IR s ,
        !            64: .B {\|}
        !            65: by default.
        !            66: Blanks and tabs at the beginning of each line are thrown away.
        !            67: Constructed arguments may not exceed 255 characters.
        !            68: Option
        !            69: .B \-x
        !            70: is implied.
        !            71: .TP
        !            72: .BI \-n n\^
        !            73: Execute
        !            74: .I command\^
        !            75: using as many standard input arguments as possible, up to
        !            76: .I n\^
        !            77: arguments maximum.
        !            78: .TP
        !            79: .B \-t
        !            80: Trace mode: The
        !            81: .I command\^
        !            82: and each constructed argument list are echoed to file descriptor 2
        !            83: just prior to their execution.
        !            84: .TP
        !            85: .B \-p
        !            86: Prompt about whether to execute
        !            87: .I command.
        !            88: Trace mode
        !            89: .RB ( \-t )
        !            90: is turned on to print the command instance to be executed,
        !            91: followed by
        !            92: .BR ?.\|.\|. .
        !            93: The command will be executed if and only if the
        !            94: reply begins with 
        !            95: .LR y .
        !            96: .TP
        !            97: .B \-x
        !            98: Terminate if any argument list would be greater than
        !            99: .I size\^
        !           100: characters.
        !           101: .TP
        !           102: .BI \-s size\^
        !           103: The maximum total size of each argument list is
        !           104: .I size\^
        !           105: characters, 470 by default.
        !           106: .TP
        !           107: .BI \-e eofstr\^
        !           108: .I Eofstr\^
        !           109: (
        !           110: .L _
        !           111: by default)
        !           112: is the logical end-of-file string.
        !           113: Normally
        !           114: .I xargs\^
        !           115: reads standard input up to a logical or an actual end-of-file.
        !           116: Option
        !           117: .B \-e
        !           118: with no
        !           119: .I eofstr
        !           120: turns off logical end-of-file testing.
        !           121: .PP
        !           122: .I Xargs\^
        !           123: will terminate if it receives a return code of
        !           124: .B \-1
        !           125: from,
        !           126: or cannot execute,
        !           127: .IR command .
        !           128: .SH EXAMPLES
        !           129: .TP
        !           130: .L
        !           131: ls $1 \|| xargs \-i \-t mv $1/{\|} $2/{\|}
        !           132: Move all files from directory
        !           133: .L $1
        !           134: to directory
        !           135: .LR $2 ,
        !           136: and echo each move
        !           137: command just before doing it.
        !           138: .TP
        !           139: .L
        !           140: (logname; date; echo $0 $*) | xargs >>log
        !           141: Combine the output of the parenthesized commands onto one line,
        !           142: which is then echoed to the end of file
        !           143: .LR log .
        !           144: .TP
        !           145: .L
        !           146: ls | xargs \-p \-l ar r arch
        !           147: Ask which files in the current directory are to be archived
        !           148: and archive them one at a time.
        !           149: .TP
        !           150: .L
        !           151: ls | xargs \-p \-l | xargs ar r arch
        !           152: Same, but archive many at a time.
        !           153: .TP
        !           154: .L
        !           155: echo $** | xargs \-n2 diff
        !           156: Execute
        !           157: .IR diff (1)
        !           158: with successive
        !           159: pairs of arguments originally typed as shell arguments.
        !           160: .SH "SEE ALSO"
        !           161: .IR sh (1), 
        !           162: .IR apply (1)
        !           163: .\"    @(#)xargs.1     6.2 of 9/2/83

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