fish-shell/doc_src/cmds/echo.rst
Johannes Altmanninger 414d9a1eb1 Reference more non-fish shell builtins that have relevant differences
When writing scripts for other shells, it can be confusing and annoying
that our `man` function shadows other manual pages, for example `exec(1p)`
from [Linux man-pages]. I almost never want to see the fish variant for such
contended cases (which obviuosly don't include fish-specific commands like
`string`, only widely-known shell builtins).

For the contented cases like `exec`, the POSIX documentation is more
substantial and useful, since it describes a (sub)set of languages widely
used for scripting.

Because of this I think we should stop overriding the system's man pages.
Nowadays we offer `exec -h` as intuitive way to show the documentation for
the fish-specific command (note that `help` is not a good replacement because
it uses a web browser).

Looking through the contended commands, it seems like for most of them,
the fish version is not substantially different from the system version.
A notable exception is `read` but I don't think it's a very important one.

So I think we should can sacrifice a bit of the native fish-scripting
experience in exchange for playing nicer with other shells. I think the
latter is more important because scripting is not our focus, the way I see it.
So maybe put our manpath at the end.

In lieu of that, let's at least have `exec.rst` reference the system variant.

[Linux man-pages]: https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/

Closes #10376
2024-04-20 13:34:08 +02:00

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1.3 KiB
ReStructuredText

.. _cmd-echo:
echo - display a line of text
=============================
Synopsis
--------
.. synopsis::
echo [OPTIONS] [STRING]
Description
-----------
.. only:: builder_man
NOTE: This page documents the fish builtin ``echo``.
To see the documentation on any non-fish versions, use ``command man echo``.
``echo`` displays *STRING* of text.
The following options are available:
**-n**
Do not output a newline.
**-s**
Do not separate arguments with spaces.
**-E**
Disable interpretation of backslash escapes (default).
**-e**
Enable interpretation of backslash escapes.
Unlike other shells, this echo accepts ``--`` to signal the end of the options.
Escape Sequences
----------------
If ``-e`` is used, the following sequences are recognized:
- ``\`` backslash
- ``\a`` alert (BEL)
- ``\b`` backspace
- ``\c`` produce no further output
- ``\e`` escape
- ``\f`` form feed
- ``\n`` new line
- ``\r`` carriage return
- ``\t`` horizontal tab
- ``\v`` vertical tab
- ``\0NNN`` byte with octal value NNN (1 to 3 digits)
- ``\xHH`` byte with hexadecimal value HH (1 to 2 digits)
Example
-------
::
> echo 'Hello World'
Hello World
> echo -e 'Top\nBottom'
Top
Bottom
> echo -- -n
-n
See Also
--------
- the :doc:`printf <printf>` command, for more control over output formatting