1.\" $OpenBSD: fmt.1,v 1.21 2007/05/31 19:20:10 jmc Exp $ 2.\" 3.\" Copyright (c) 1980, 1990, 1993 4.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved. 5.\" 6.\" Redistribution and use in source and binary forms, with or without 7.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions 8.\" are met: 9.\" 1. Redistributions of source code must retain the above copyright 10.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer. 11.\" 2. Redistributions in binary form must reproduce the above copyright 12.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer in the 13.\" documentation and/or other materials provided with the distribution. 14.\" 3. Neither the name of the University nor the names of its contributors 15.\" may be used to endorse or promote products derived from this software 16.\" without specific prior written permission. 17.\" 18.\" THIS SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED BY THE REGENTS AND CONTRIBUTORS ``AS IS'' AND 19.\" ANY EXPRESS OR IMPLIED WARRANTIES, INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, THE 20.\" IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY AND FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE 21.\" ARE DISCLAIMED. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE REGENTS OR CONTRIBUTORS BE LIABLE 22.\" FOR ANY DIRECT, INDIRECT, INCIDENTAL, SPECIAL, EXEMPLARY, OR CONSEQUENTIAL 23.\" DAMAGES (INCLUDING, BUT NOT LIMITED TO, PROCUREMENT OF SUBSTITUTE GOODS 24.\" OR SERVICES; LOSS OF USE, DATA, OR PROFITS; OR BUSINESS INTERRUPTION) 25.\" HOWEVER CAUSED AND ON ANY THEORY OF LIABILITY, WHETHER IN CONTRACT, STRICT 26.\" LIABILITY, OR TORT (INCLUDING NEGLIGENCE OR OTHERWISE) ARISING IN ANY WAY 27.\" OUT OF THE USE OF THIS SOFTWARE, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF 28.\" SUCH DAMAGE. 29.\" 30.\" @(#)fmt.1 8.1 (Berkeley) 6/6/93 31.\" 32.Dd $Mdocdate: May 31 2007 $ 33.Dt FMT 1 34.Os 35.Sh NAME 36.Nm fmt 37.Nd simple text formatter 38.Sh SYNOPSIS 39.Nm fmt 40.Op Fl cmnps 41.Op Fl d Ar chars 42.Op Fl l Ar number 43.Op Fl t Ar number 44.br 45.Oo 46.Ar goal 47.Oo Ar maximum Oc \*(Ba 48.Fl Ns Ar width \*(Ba 49.Fl w Ar width 50.Oc 51.Op Ar 52.Sh DESCRIPTION 53.Nm 54is a simple text formatter which reads the concatenation of input 55files (or standard input if none are given) and produces on standard 56output a version of its input with lines as close to the 57.Ar goal 58length 59as possible without exceeding the 60.Ar maximum . 61The 62.Ar goal 63length defaults 64to 65 and the 65.Ar maximum 66to 10 more than the 67.Ar goal 68length. 69.Pp 70Alternatively, a single 71.Ar width 72parameter can be specified either by prepending a hyphen to it or by using 73.Fl w . 74For example, 75.Dq fmt -w 72 , 76.Dq fmt -72 , 77and 78.Dq fmt 72 72 79all produce identical output. 80The spacing at the beginning of the input lines is preserved in the output, 81as are blank lines and interword spacing. 82Lines are joined or split only at white space; that is, words are never 83joined or hyphenated. 84.Pp 85The options are as follows: 86.Bl -tag -width Ds 87.It Fl c 88Center the text, line by line. 89In this case, most of the other 90options are ignored; no splitting or joining of lines is done. 91.It Fl d Ar chars 92Treat 93.Ar chars 94(and no others) as sentence-ending characters. 95By default the 96sentence-ending characters are full stop 97.Pq Ql \&. , 98question mark 99.Pq Ql \&? , 100and exclamation mark 101.Pq Ql \&! . 102Remember that some characters may need to be 103escaped to protect them from the shell. 104.It Fl l Ar number 105Replace multiple spaces with tabs at the start of each output 106line, if possible. 107.Ar number 108spaces will be replaced with one tab. 109.It Fl m 110Try to format mail header lines contained in the input sensibly. 111.It Fl n 112Format lines beginning with a 113.Ql \&. 114(dot) character. 115Normally, 116.Nm 117does not fill these lines, for compatibility with 118.Xr troff 1 119and 120.Xr nroff 1 . 121.It Fl p 122Allow indented paragraphs. 123Without the 124.Fl p 125flag, any change in the amount of whitespace at the start of a line 126results in a new paragraph being begun. 127.It Fl s 128Collapse whitespace inside lines, so that multiple whitespace 129characters are turned into a single space 130(or, at the end of a 131sentence, a double space). 132.It Fl t Ar number 133Assume that the input files' tabs assume 134.Ar number 135spaces per tab stop. 136The default is 8. 137.El 138.Pp 139.Nm 140is meant to format mail messages prior to sending, but may also be useful 141for other simple tasks. 142For instance, 143within an editor such as 144.Xr vi 1 , 145the following command 146will reformat a paragraph, 147evening the lines: 148.Pp 149.Dl !}fmt 150.Sh SEE ALSO 151.Xr indent 1 , 152.Xr mail 1 , 153.Xr nroff 1 , 154.Xr vi 1 155.Sh HISTORY 156The 157.Nm 158command appeared in 159.Bx 3 . 160.Pp 161The version described herein is a complete rewrite and appeared in 162.Ox 2.4 . 163.Sh AUTHORS 164.An Kurt Shoens 165.An Liz Allen 166(added goal length concept) 167.An Gareth McCaughan 168(wrote this version) 169.Sh BUGS 170The program was designed to be simple and fast \(en for more complex 171operations, the standard text processors are likely to be more appropriate. 172.Pp 173When the first line of an indented paragraph is very long (more than 174about twice the goal length), the indentation in the output can be 175wrong. 176.Pp 177.Nm 178is not infallible in guessing what lines are mail headers and what 179lines are not. 180