1PWD(1P) POSIX Programmer's Manual PWD(1P)
2
6 This manual page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual. The Linux
7 implementation of this interface may differ (consult the corresponding
8 Linux manual page for details of Linux behavior), or the interface may
9 not be implemented on Linux.
10
12 pwd — return working directory name
13
15 pwd [-L|-P]
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18 The pwd utility shall write to standard output an absolute pathname of
19 the current working directory, which does not contain the filenames dot
20 or dot-dot.
21
23 The pwd utility shall conform to the Base Definitions volume of
24 POSIX.1‐2017, Section 12.2, Utility Syntax Guidelines.
25 The following options shall be supported by the implementation:
27 -L If the PWD environment variable contains an absolute pathname
29 of the current directory and the pathname does not contain
30 any components that are dot or dot-dot, pwd shall write this
31 pathname to standard output, except that if the PWD environ‐
32 ment variable is longer than {PATH_MAX} bytes including the
33 terminating null, it is unspecified whether pwd writes this
34 pathname to standard output or behaves as if the -P option
35 had been specified. Otherwise, the -L option shall behave as
36 the -P option.
37 -P The pathname written to standard output shall not contain any
39 components that refer to files of type symbolic link. If
40 there are multiple pathnames that the pwd utility could write
41 to standard output, one beginning with a single <slash> char‐
42 acter and one or more beginning with two <slash> characters,
43 then it shall write the pathname beginning with a single
44 <slash> character. The pathname shall not contain any unnec‐
45 essary <slash> characters after the leading one or two
46 <slash> characters.
47 If both -L and -P are specified, the last one shall apply. If neither
49 -L nor -P is specified, the pwd utility shall behave as if -L had been
50 specified.
51
53 None.
54
56 Not used.
57
59 None.
60
62 The following environment variables shall affect the execution of pwd:
63 LANG Provide a default value for the internationalization vari‐
65 ables that are unset or null. (See the Base Definitions vol‐
66 ume of POSIX.1‐2017, Section 8.2, Internationalization Vari‐
67 ables the precedence of internationalization variables used
68 to determine the values of locale categories.)
69 LC_ALL If set to a non-empty string value, override the values of
71 all the other internationalization variables.
72 LC_MESSAGES
74 Determine the locale that should be used to affect the format
75 and contents of diagnostic messages written to standard
76 error.
77 NLSPATH Determine the location of message catalogs for the processing
79 of LC_MESSAGES.
80 PWD An absolute pathname of the current working directory. If an
82 application sets or unsets the value of PWD, the behavior of
83 pwd is unspecified.
84
86 Default.
87
89 The pwd utility output is an absolute pathname of the current working
90 directory:
91 "%s\n", <directory pathname>
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96 The standard error shall be used only for diagnostic messages.
97
99 None.
100
102 None.
103
105 The following exit values shall be returned:
106 0 Successful completion.
108 >0 An error occurred.
110
112 If an error is detected, output shall not be written to standard out‐
113 put, a diagnostic message shall be written to standard error, and the
114 exit status is not zero.
115 The following sections are informative.
117
119 If the pathname obtained from pwd is longer than {PATH_MAX} bytes, it
120 could produce an error if passed to cd. Therefore, in order to return
121 to that directory it may be necessary to break the pathname into sec‐
122 tions shorter than {PATH_MAX} and call cd on each section in turn (the
123 first section being an absolute pathname and subsequent sections being
124 relative pathnames).
125
127 None.
128
130 Some implementations have historically provided pwd as a shell special
131 built-in command.
132 In most utilities, if an error occurs, partial output may be written to
134 standard output. This does not happen in historical implementations of
135 pwd. Because pwd is frequently used in historical shell scripts with‐
136 out checking the exit status, it is important that the historical
137 behavior is required here; therefore, the CONSEQUENCES OF ERRORS sec‐
138 tion specifically disallows any partial output being written to stan‐
139 dard output.
140 An earlier version of this standard stated that the PWD environment
142 variable was affected when the -P option was in effect. This was incor‐
143 rect; conforming implementations do not do this.
144
146 None.
147
149 cd
150 The Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2017, Chapter 8, Environment
152 Variables, Section 12.2, Utility Syntax Guidelines
153 The System Interfaces volume of POSIX.1‐2017, getcwd()
155
157 Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form
158 from IEEE Std 1003.1-2017, Standard for Information Technology -- Por‐
159 table Operating System Interface (POSIX), The Open Group Base Specifi‐
160 cations Issue 7, 2018 Edition, Copyright (C) 2018 by the Institute of
161 Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open Group. In the
162 event of any discrepancy between this version and the original IEEE and
163 The Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group Standard
164 is the referee document. The original Standard can be obtained online
165 at http://www.opengroup.org/unix/online.html .
166 Any typographical or formatting errors that appear in this page are
168 most likely to have been introduced during the conversion of the source
169 files to man page format. To report such errors, see https://www.ker‐
170 nel.org/doc/man-pages/reporting_bugs.html .
171IEEE/The Open Group 2017 PWD(1P)