Command (Unix)

command

Operating system	Unix and Unix-like
Type	Command

command is a shell command for Unix and Unix-like operating systems. It is used to execute a command whilst suppressing normal shell function lookup. ^[1]

It is specified in the POSIX standard and is often implemented in Unix shells as a shell builtin function. Built-in functions take precedence over programs when resolving the name of a command. A user may suppress the lookup of built-in functions in order to execute a program with the same name as a built-in function.^{[ citation needed ]}

The arguments passed specify the name of the command to be executed, along with its arguments. If the specified command name is the name of a shell built-in function, the command will be processed as if such function did not exist. In all other circumstances the command will be processed as normal. ^[2]

Examples

In the following, the ls command is run without any shell functions or aliases that may exist with the same name:

$ commandls 

See also

• List of Unix commands

References

1. "command - manned.org". POSIX Programmer's Manual. Retrieved 13 February 2025.
2. "command(1p)". Linux manual page. Retrieved 13 February 2025.

External links

• command  – Shell and Utilities Reference, The Single UNIX Specification , Version 4 from The Open Group