xref: /freebsd/usr.bin/apply/apply.1 (revision 4f8f43b06ed07e96a250855488cc531799d5b78f)
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28.\"     @(#)apply.1	8.2 (Berkeley) 4/4/94
29.\"
30.Dd January 28, 2022
31.Dt APPLY 1
32.Os
33.Sh NAME
34.Nm apply
35.Nd apply a command to a set of arguments
36.Sh SYNOPSIS
37.Nm
38.Op Fl a Ar c
39.Op Fl d
40.Op Cm - Ns Ar #
41.Ar command argument ...
42.Sh DESCRIPTION
43The
44.Nm
45utility runs the named
46.Ar command
47on each
48argument
49.Ar argument
50in turn.
51.Pp
52Character sequences of the form
53.Dq Li \&%d
54in
55.Ar command ,
56where
57.Sq Li d
58is a digit from 1 to 9, are replaced by the
59.Li d Ns \'th
60following unused
61.Ar argument .
62In this case, the largest digit number of arguments are discarded for
63each execution of
64.Ar command .
65.Pp
66The options are as follows:
67.Bl -tag -width indent
68.It Cm - Ns Ar #
69Normally arguments are taken singly; the optional number
70.Ar #
71specifies the number of arguments to be passed to
72.Ar command .
73If the number is zero,
74.Ar command
75is run, without arguments, once for each
76.Ar argument .
77.Pp
78If any sequences of
79.Dq Li \&%d
80occur in
81.Ar command ,
82the
83.Fl #
84option is ignored.
85.It Fl a Ar c
86The use of the character
87.Sq Li %
88as a magic character may be changed with the
89.Fl a
90option.
91.It Fl d
92Display the commands that would have been executed, but do not actually
93execute them.
94.El
95.Sh ENVIRONMENT
96The following environment variable affects the execution of
97.Nm :
98.Bl -tag -width SHELL
99.It Ev SHELL
100Pathname of shell to use.
101If this variable is not defined, the Bourne shell is used.
102.El
103.Sh FILES
104.Bl -tag -width /bin/sh -compact
105.It Pa /bin/sh
106default shell
107.El
108.Sh EXAMPLES
109.Bl -tag -width apply -compact
110.It Li "apply echo *"
111is similar to
112.Xr ls 1 ;
113.It Li "apply \-2 cmp a1 b1 a2 b2 a3 b3"
114compares the `a' files to the `b' files;
115.It Li "apply \-0 who 1 2 3 4 5"
116runs
117.Xr who 1
1185 times; and
119.It Li "apply \'ln %1 /usr/joe\'" *
120links all files in the current directory to the directory
121.Pa /usr/joe .
122.El
123.Sh HISTORY
124The
125.Nm
126command appeared in
127.Bx 4.2 .
128.Sh AUTHORS
129.An Rob Pike
130.Sh BUGS
131Shell metacharacters in
132.Ar command
133may have bizarre effects; it is best to enclose complicated
134commands in single quotes
135.Pq '' .
136.Pp
137The
138.Nm
139utility does not recognize multibyte characters.
140