cli parameters

[Kurt Wall]

In a 0.5K blaze of typing glory, Ian Stephen wrote:
> Question for the programmers out there.
> 
> Is there a standard for command-line parameters passed to Linux
> programs?
> 
> Some things seem common like "-o <filename>" specifying an output
> filename or "-f" meaning force, but are these just common practise or is
> there an actual standard available somewhere?

I'm not aware of a formal standard, but the idioms are pretty well
established for common options ("-" to write to stdout or read from
stdin, for example). The GNU coding standards at 
http://www.gnu.org/prep/standards_toc.html#SEC_Contents might 
provide some hints, but I think they mostly address those delightful
GNU long options.

Kurt
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