read

Get help on Linux read Command.

Linux read command is use to read a line from the standard input and split it into fields on Linux system. The Linux read command is one of bash shell built in command. The command example below show how to get read command manual or help on Linux read command using shell command, this help show information on how to use the Linux read command, the read command options and the arguments that can be use with Linux read command.

Get Linux read command help

Execute help command and the name of Linux command that we want the help file, the example below we execute help command with -m option to get the help for read command using the manpage format.

[linux@fedora11 ~]$ help -m read

NAME

read - Read a line from the standard input and split it into fields.

SYNOPSIS

read [-ers] [-a array] [-d delim] [-i text] [-n nchars] [-p prompt] [-t timeout] [-u fd] [name ...]

DESCRIPTION

Read a line from the standard input and split it into fields.

Reads a single line from the standard input, or from file descriptor FD

if the -u option is supplied. The line is split into fields as with word

splitting, and the first word is assigned to the first NAME, the second

word to the second NAME, and so on, with any leftover words assigned to

the last NAME. Only the characters found in $IFS are recognized as word

delimiters.

If no NAMEs are supplied, the line read is stored in the REPLY variable.

Options:

-a array assign the words read to sequential indices of the array

variable ARRAY, starting at zero

-d delim continue until the first character of DELIM is read, rather

than newline

-e use Readline to obtain the line in an interactive shell

-i text Use TEXT as the initial text for Readline

-n nchars return after reading NCHARS characters rather than waiting

for a newline

-p prompt output the string PROMPT without a trailing newline before

attempting to read

-r do not allow backslashes to escape any characters

-s do not echo input coming from a terminal

-t timeout time out and return failure if a complete line of input is

not read withint TIMEOUT seconds. The value of the TMOUT

variable is the default timeout. TIMEOUT may be a

fractional number. If TIMEOUT is 0, read returns success only

if input is available on the specified file descriptor. The

exit status is greater than 128 if the timeout is exceeded

-u fd read from file descriptor FD instead of the standard input

Exit Status:

The return code is zero, unless end-of-file is encountered, read times out,

or an invalid file descriptor is supplied as the argument to -u.

SEE ALSO

bash(1)

IMPLEMENTATION

GNU bash, version 4.0.16(1)-release (i386-redhat-linux-gnu)

License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>

[linux@fedora11 ~]$

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