getopt(1)                USER COMMANDS                  getopt(1)



NAME
     getopt - parse command options

SYNOPSIS
     set -- `getopt optstring $*`

DESCRIPTION
     The getopts command supercedes getopt.   For  more  informa-
     tion, see the NOTES below.

     getopt is used to break up options in command lines for easy
     parsing  by shell procedures and to check for legal options.
     optstring is a string  of  recognized  option  letters;  see
     getopt(3C).   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 -- is
     used to delimit the end of  the  options.   If  it  is  used
     explicitly,  getopt  recognizes  it;  otherwise, getopt gen-
     erates it; in either case, getopt places it at  the  end  of
     the  options.   The positional parameters ($1 $2 ...) of the
     shell are reset so that each option is preceded by a  -  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 one 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





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getopt(1)                USER COMMANDS                  getopt(1)



SEE ALSO
     getopts(1), sh(1).
     getopt(3C) in the Programmer's Reference Manual.

DIAGNOSTICS
     getopt prints an error message on the standard error when it
     encounters an option letter not included in optstring.

NOTES
     getopt will not be supported in the next major release.  For
     this release a conversion tool has been provided, getoptcvt.
     For  more  information  about  getopts  and  getoptcvt,  see
     getopts(1).

     Reset optind to 1 when rescanning the options.  getopt  does
     not  support  the part of Rule 8 of the command syntax stan-
     dard [see intro(1)] that permits groups of  option-arguments
     following  an  option  to  be  separated  by white space and
     quoted.  For example,

          cmd -a -b -o "xxx z yy" file
     is not handled correctly.  To correct this  deficiency,  use
     the getopts command in place of getopt.

     If an option that takes an option-argument is followed by  a
     value  that is the same as one of the options listed in opt-
     string (referring to the earlier EXAMPLE section, but  using
     the  following command line:  cmd -o -a file), getopt always
     treats -a as an option-argument to -o; it  never  recognizes
     -a as an option.  For this case, the for loop in the example
     shifts past the file argument.
























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