GETOPT(1) DOMAIN/IX Reference Manual (SYS5) GETOPT(1)
NAME
getopt - parse command options
USAGE
set - - `getopt optstring $*`
DESCRIPTION
Getopt breaks up options in command lines for easy parsing
by Shell procedures, and for checking for legal options.
Optstring is a string of recognized option letters. See
getopt (3C) for more information. If a letter is followed
by a colon, the option is expected to have an argument which
may or may not be separated from it by white space.
The special option represented by two subsequent dashes (-
-) delimits the end of the options. If you use it expli-
citly, getopt recognizes it; otherwise, getopt generates it.
In either case, this special option is placed at the end of
the list of options.
The Shell's positional parameters ($1 $2 ...) are reset so
that each option is preceded by a dash (-) and is in its own
positional parameter. Each option argument is also parsed
into its own positional parameter.
EXAMPLE
The following code fragment shows how you might process the
arguments for a command that can take the options a or b, as
well as the option o, which requires an argument:
set - - `getopt abo: $*`
if [ $? != 0 ]
then
echo $USAGE
exit 2
fi
for i in $*
do
case $i in
-a | -b) FLAG=$i; shift;;
-o) OARG=$2; shift 2;;
- -) shift; break;;
esac
done
This code accepts any of the following as equivalent:
cmd -aoarg file file
cmd -a -o arg file file
cmd -oarg -a file file
cmd -a -oarg - - file file
Printed 6/10/85 GETOPT-1
GETOPT(1) DOMAIN/IX Reference Manual (SYS5) GETOPT(1)
DIAGNOSTICS
Getopt prints an error message on the standard error when it
encounters an option letter not included in optstring.
RELATED INFORMATION
sh (1), getopt (3C).
GETOPT-2 Printed 6/10/85