alias(1) User Commands alias(1)NAME
alias, unalias - create or remove a pseudonym or shorthand for a com‐
mand or series of commands
SYNOPSIS
/usr/bin/alias [ alias-name [ = string...]]
/usr/bin/unalias alias-name...
/usr/bin/unalias -a
csh
alias [ name [def]]
unalias pattern
ksh
alias [-tx] [ name [ = value]...]
unalias name...
unalias [-a]
DESCRIPTION
The alias and unalias utilities create or remove a pseudonym or short‐
hand term for a command or series of commands, with different function‐
ality in the C-shell and Korn shell environments.
/usr/bin/alias
The alias utility creates or redefines alias definitions or writes the
values of existing alias definitions to standard output. An alias defi‐
nition provides a string value that replaces a command name when it is
encountered.
An alias definition affects the current shell execution environment and
the execution environments of the subshells of the current shell. When
used as specified by this document, the alias definition will not
affect the parent process of the current shell nor any utility environ‐
ment invoked by the shell.
/usr/bin/unalias
The unalias utility removes the definition for each alias name speci‐
fied. The aliases are removed from the current shell execution environ‐
ment. The -a option removes all alias definitions from the current exe‐
cution environment.
csh
alias assigns def to the alias name. The assigned def is a list of
words that may contain escaped history-substitution metasyntax. name is
not allowed to be alias or unalias. If def is omitted, the alias name
is displayed along with its current definition. If both name and def
are omitted, all aliases are displayed.
Because of implementation restrictions, an alias definition must have
been entered on a previous command line before it can be used.
unalias discards aliases that match (filename substitution) pattern.
All aliases may be removed by `unalias *'.
ksh
alias with no arguments prints the list of aliases in the form
name=value on standard output. An alias is defined for each name whose
value is given. A trailing space in value causes the next word to be
checked for alias substitution. The -t flag is used to set and list
tracked aliases. The value of a tracked alias is the full pathname cor‐
responding to the given name. The value becomes undefined when the
value of PATH is reset but the aliases remained tracked. Without the
-t flag, for each name in the argument list for which no value is
given, the name and value of the alias is printed. The -x flag is used
to set or print exported aliases. An exported alias is defined for
scripts invoked by name. The exit status is non-zero if a name is
given, but no value, and no alias has been defined for the name.
The aliases given by the list of names may be removed from the alias
list with unalias.
OPTIONS
The following option is supported by unalias:
-a Removes all alias definitions from the current shell execution
environment.
ksh
The following option is supported by alias:
-t Sets and lists tracked aliases.
OPERANDS
The following operands are supported:
alias
alias-name Write the alias definition to standard output.
unalias
alias-name The name of an alias to be removed.
alias-name=string Assign the value of string to the alias alias-
name.
If no operands are given, all alias definitions will be written to
standard output.
OUTPUT
The format for displaying aliases (when no operands or only name oper‐
ands are specified) is:
"%s=%s\n" name, value
The value string will be written with appropriate quoting so that it is
suitable for reinput to the shell.
EXAMPLES
Example 1: Modifying a command's output
This example specifies that the output of the ls utility is columnated
and more annotated:
example% alias ls="ls −CF"
Example 2: Repeating previous entries in the command history file
This example creates a simple "redo" command to repeat previous entries
in the command history file:
example% alias r='fc −s'
Example 3: Specifying a command's output options
This example provides that the du utility summarize disk output in
units of 1024 bytes:
example% alias du=du −k
Example 4: Dealing with an argument that is itself an alias name
This example sets up the nohup utility so that it can deal with an
argument that is itself an alias name:
example% alias nohup="nohup "
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
See environ(5) for descriptions of the following environment variables
that affect the execution of alias and unalias: LANG, LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE,
LC_MESSAGES, and NLSPATH.
EXIT STATUS
The following exit values are returned:
0 Successful completion.
alias
>0 One of the alias-name operands specified did not have an alias
definition, or an error occurred.
unalias
>0 One of the alias-name operands specified did not represent a
valid alias definition, or an error occurred.
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attributes:
┌─────────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────────┐
│ ATTRIBUTE TYPE │ ATTRIBUTE VALUE │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│Availability │SUNWcsu │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│Interface Stability │Standard │
└─────────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────┘
SEE ALSOcsh(1), ksh(1), shell_builtins(1), attributes(5), environ(5), stan‐
dards(5)SunOS 5.10 17 Jul 2002 alias(1)