adjust.1 (2010 09)

a
adjust(1) adjust(1)
NAME
adjust - simple text formatter
SYNOPSIS
adjust [-b][-c
|-j|-r][-m column][-t tabsize ][files ]...
DESCRIPTION
The
adjust command is a simple text formatter for filling, centering, left and right justifying, or only
right justifying text paragraphs, and is designed for interactive use. It reads the concatenation of input
files (or standard input if none are given) and produces on standard output a formatted version of its
input, with each paragraph formatted separately. If -
is given as an input filename, adjust reads stan-
dard input at that point (use
--
as an argument to separate - from options.)
adjust reads text from input lines as a series of words separated by space characters, tabs, or newlines.
Text lines are grouped into paragraphs separated by blank lines. By default, text is copied directly to the
output, subject only to simple filling (see below) with a right margin of 72, and leading spaces are con-
verted to tabs where possible.
Options
The
adjust command recognizes the following command-line options:
-b Do not convert leading space characters to tabs on output; (output contains no tabs, even
if there were tabs in input).
-c Center text on each line. Lines are pre- and post-processed, but no filling is performed.
-j Justify text. After filling, insert spaces in each line as needed to right justify it (except in
the last line of each paragraph) while keeping the justified left margin.
-r After filling text, adjust the indentation of each line for a smooth right margin (ragged
left margin).
-mcolumn
Set the right fill margin to the given column number, instead of 72. Text is filled, and
optionally right justified, so that no output line extends beyond this column (if possible).
If -m0 is given, the current right margin of the first line of each paragraph is used for
that and all subsequent lines in the paragraph.
By default, text is centered on column 40. With
-c, the -m option sets the middle column
of the centering "window", but -m0 auto-sets the right side as before (which then deter-
mines the center of the "window").
-ttabsize Set the tab size to other than the default (eight columns).
Only one of the
-c, -j, and -r options is allowed in a single command line.
Details
Before doing anything else to a line of input text,
adjust first handles backspaces, rubbing out preced-
ing characters in the usual way. Next, it ignores all nonprintable characters except tab. It then expands
all tabs to spaces.
For simple text filling, the first word of the first line of each paragraph is indented the same amount as in
the input line. Each word is then carried to the output followed by one space. "Words" ending in
terminal_character[quote ][closing_character] are followed by two spaces, where terminal_character is
any of
., :, ?,or!; quote is a single closing quote (’) or double-quote character ("), and close is any of ),
],or}. Here are some examples:
end. of? sentence.’ sorts!" of.) words?"]
(adjust does not place two spaces after a pair of single closing quotes (’’) following a
terminal_character).
adjust starts a new output line whenever adding a word (other than the first one) to the current line
would exceed the right margin.
adjust understands indented first lines of paragraphs (such as this one) when filling. The
second and subsequent lines of each paragraph are indented the same amount as the second line of the
input paragraph if there is a second line, else the same as the first line.
HP-UX 11i Version 3: September 2010 − 1 − Hewlett-Packard Company 1