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This manual page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual. The Linux implementation of
this interface may differ (consult the corresponding Linux manual page for details of
Linux behavior), or the interface may not be implemented on Linux.
NAME
pwd — return working directory name
SYNOPSIS
pwd [-L|-P]
DESCRIPTION
The pwd utility shall write to standard output an absolute pathname of the current working
directory, which does not contain the filenames dot or dot-dot.
OPTIONS
The pwd utility shall conform to the Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2017, Section
12.2, Utility Syntax Guidelines.
The following options shall be supported by the implementation:
-L If the PWD environment variable contains an absolute pathname of the current
directory and the pathname does not contain any components that are dot or dot-
dot, pwd shall write this pathname to standard output, except that if the PWD
environment variable is longer than {PATH_MAX} bytes including the terminating
null, it is unspecified whether pwd writes this pathname to standard output or
behaves as if the -P option had been specified. Otherwise, the -L option shall
behave as the -P option.
-P The pathname written to standard output shall not contain any components that
refer to files of type symbolic link. If there are multiple pathnames that the
pwd utility could write to standard output, one beginning with a single <slash>
character and one or more beginning with two <slash> characters, then it shall
write the pathname beginning with a single <slash> character. The pathname shall
not contain any unnecessary <slash> characters after the leading one or two
<slash> characters.
If both -L and -P are specified, the last one shall apply. If neither -L nor -P is
specified, the pwd utility shall behave as if -L had been specified.
OPERANDS
None.
STDIN
Not used.
INPUT FILES
None.
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
The following environment variables shall affect the execution of pwd:
LANG Provide a default value for the internationalization variables that are unset or
null. (See the Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2017, Section 8.2,
Internationalization Variables the precedence of internationalization variables
used to determine the values of locale categories.)
LC_ALL If set to a non-empty string value, override the values of all the other
internationalization variables.
LC_MESSAGES
Determine the locale that should be used to affect the format and contents of
diagnostic messages written to standard error.
NLSPATH Determine the location of message catalogs for the processing of LC_MESSAGES.
PWD An absolute pathname of the current working directory. If an application sets or
unsets the value of PWD, the behavior of pwd is unspecified.
ASYNCHRONOUS EVENTS
Default.
STDOUT
The pwd utility output is an absolute pathname of the current working directory:
"%s\n", <directory pathname>
STDERR
The standard error shall be used only for diagnostic messages.
OUTPUT FILES
None.
EXTENDED DESCRIPTION
None.
EXIT STATUS
The following exit values shall be returned:
0 Successful completion.
>0 An error occurred.
CONSEQUENCES OF ERRORS
If an error is detected, output shall not be written to standard output, a diagnostic
message shall be written to standard error, and the exit status is not zero.
The following sections are informative.
APPLICATION USAGE
If the pathname obtained from pwd is longer than {PATH_MAX} bytes, it could produce an
error if passed to cd. Therefore, in order to return to that directory it may be
necessary to break the pathname into sections shorter than {PATH_MAX} and call cd on each
section in turn (the first section being an absolute pathname and subsequent sections
being relative pathnames).
EXAMPLES
None.
RATIONALE
Some implementations have historically provided pwd as a shell special built-in command.
In most utilities, if an error occurs, partial output may be written to standard output.
This does not happen in historical implementations of pwd. Because pwd is frequently used
in historical shell scripts without checking the exit status, it is important that the
historical behavior is required here; therefore, the CONSEQUENCES OF ERRORS section
specifically disallows any partial output being written to standard output.
An earlier version of this standard stated that the PWD environment variable was affected
when the -P option was in effect. This was incorrect; conforming implementations do not do
this.
FUTURE DIRECTIONS
None.
SEE ALSO
cd
The Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2017, Chapter 8, Environment Variables, Section
12.2, Utility Syntax Guidelines
The System Interfaces volume of POSIX.1‐2017, getcwd()
COPYRIGHT
Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form from IEEE Std
1003.1-2017, Standard for Information Technology -- Portable Operating System Interface
(POSIX), The Open Group Base Specifications Issue 7, 2018 Edition, Copyright (C) 2018 by
the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open Group. In the
event of any discrepancy between this version and the original IEEE and The Open Group
Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group Standard is the referee document. The
original Standard can be obtained online at http://www.opengroup.org/unix/online.html .
Any typographical or formatting errors that appear in this page are most likely to have
been introduced during the conversion of the source files to man page format. To report
such errors, see https://www.kernel.org/doc/man-pages/reporting_bugs.html .