BAT(1) User Commands BAT(1)

NAME

bat - a cat(1) clone with syntax highlighting and Git integration.

USAGE

bat [OPTIONS] [FILE]...

bat cache [CACHE-OPTIONS] [--build|--clear]

DESCRIPTION

bat prints the syntax-highlighted content of a collection of FILEs to
the terminal. If no FILE is specified, or when FILE is '-', it reads
from standard input.

bat supports a large number of programming and markup languages. It
also communicates with git(1) to show modifications with respect to
the git index. bat automatically pipes its output through a pager
(by default: less).

Whenever the output of bat goes to a non-interactive terminal, i.e.
when the output is piped into another process or into a file, bat
will act as a drop-in replacement for cat(1) and fall back to
printing the plain file contents.

OPTIONS

General remarks: Command-line options like '-l'/'--language' that
take values can be specified as either '--language value',
'--language=value', '-l value' or '-lvalue'.

-A, --show-all

Show non-printable characters like space, tab or newline. Use
'--tabs' to control the width of the tab-placeholders.

--nonprintable-notation <notation>

Specify how to display non-printable characters when using
--show-all.

Possible values:

caret Use character sequences like ^G, ^J, ^@, .. to identify
non-printable characters

unicode
Use special Unicode code points to identify non-
printable characters

-p, --plain

Only show plain style, no decorations. This is an alias for
'--style=plain'. When '-p' is used twice ('-pp'), it also
disables automatic paging (alias for '--style=plain
--paging=never').

-l, --language <language>

Explicitly set the language for syntax highlighting. The
language can be specified as a name (like 'C++' or 'LaTeX') or
possible file extension (like 'cpp', 'hpp' or 'md'). Use
'--list-languages' to show all supported language names and
file extensions.

-H, --highlight-line <N:M>...

Highlight the specified line ranges with a different
background color. For example:

--highlight-line 40
highlights line 40

--highlight-line 30:40
highlights lines 30 to 40

--highlight-line :40
highlights lines 1 to 40

--highlight-line 40:
highlights lines 40 to the end of the file

--highlight-line 30:+10
highlights lines 30 to 40

--file-name <name>...

Specify the name to display for a file. Useful when piping
data to bat from STDIN when bat does not otherwise know the
filename. Note that the provided file name is also used for
syntax detection.

-d, --diff

Only show lines that have been added/removed/modified with
respect to the Git index. Use '--diff-context=N' to control
how much context you want to see.

--diff-context <N>...

Include N lines of context around added/removed/modified lines
when using '--diff'.

--tabs <T>

Set the tab width to T spaces. Use a width of 0 to pass tabs
through directly

--wrap <mode>

Specify the text-wrapping mode (*auto*, never, character). The
'--terminal-width' option can be used in addition to control
the output width.

--terminal-width <width>

Explicitly set the width of the terminal instead of
determining it automatically. If prefixed with '+' or '-', the
value will be treated as an offset to the actual terminal
width. See also: '--wrap'.

-n, --number

Only show line numbers, no other decorations. This is an alias
for '--style=numbers'

--color <when>

Specify when to use colored output. The automatic mode only
enables colors if an interactive terminal is detected.
Possible values: *auto*, never, always.

--italic-text <when>

Specify when to use ANSI sequences for italic text in the
output. Possible values: always, *never*.

--decorations <when>

Specify when to use the decorations that have been specified
via '--style'. The automatic mode only enables decorations if
an interactive terminal is detected. Possible values: *auto*,
never, always.

-f, --force-colorization

Alias for '--decorations=always --color=always'. This is
useful if the output of bat is piped to another program, but
you want to keep the colorization/decorations.

--paging <when>

Specify when to use the pager. To disable the pager, use
'--paging=never' or its alias, -P. To disable the pager
permanently, set BAT_PAGER to an empty string. To control
which pager is used, see the '--pager' option. Possible
values: *auto*, never, always.

--pager <command>

Determine which pager is used. This option will override the
PAGER and BAT_PAGER environment variables. The default pager
is 'less'. To control when the pager is used, see the
'--paging' option. Example: '--pager "less -RF"'.

Note: By default, if the pager is set to 'less' (and no
command-line options are specified), 'bat' will pass the
following command line options to the pager: '-R'/'--RAW-
CONTROL-CHARS', '-F'/'--quit-if-one-screen' and '-X'/'--no-
init'. The last option ('-X') is only used for 'less' versions
older than 530. The '-R' option is needed to interpret ANSI
colors correctly. The second option ('-F') instructs less to
exit immediately if the output size is smaller than the
vertical size of the terminal. This is convenient for small
files because you do not have to press 'q' to quit the pager.
The third option ('-X') is needed to fix a bug with the
'--quit-if-one-screen' feature in old versions of 'less'.
Unfortunately, it also breaks mouse-wheel support in 'less'.
If you want to enable mouse-wheel scrolling on older versions
of 'less', you can pass just '-R' (as in the example above,
this will disable the quit-if-one-screen feature). For less
530 or newer, it should work out of the box.

-m, --map-syntax <glob-pattern:syntax-name>...

Map a glob pattern to an existing syntax name. The glob
pattern is matched on the full path and the filename. For
example, to highlight *.build files with the Python syntax,
use -m '*.build:Python'. To highlight files named '.myignore'
with the Git Ignore syntax, use -m '.myignore:Git Ignore'.
Note that the right-hand side is the *name* of the syntax, not
a file extension.

--theme <theme>

Set the theme for syntax highlighting. Use '--list-themes' to
see all available themes. To set a default theme, add the
'--theme="..."' option to the configuration file or export the
BAT_THEME environment variable (e.g.: export BAT_THEME="...").

--list-themes

Display a list of supported themes for syntax highlighting.

--style <style-components>

Configure which elements (line numbers, file headers, grid
borders, Git modifications, ..) to display in addition to the
file contents. The argument is a comma-separated list of
components to display (e.g. 'numbers,changes,grid') or a
pre-defined style ('full'). To set a default style, add the
'--style=".."' option to the configuration file or export the
BAT_STYLE environment variable (e.g.: export BAT_STYLE="..").
Possible values: *default*, full, auto, plain, changes,
header, header-filename, header-filesize, grid, rule, numbers,
snip.

-r, --line-range <N:M>...

Only print the specified range of lines for each file. For
example:

--line-range 30:40
prints lines 30 to 40

--line-range :40
prints lines 1 to 40

--line-range 40:
prints lines 40 to the end of the file

--line-range 30:+10
prints lines 30 to 40

-L, --list-languages

Display a list of supported languages for syntax highlighting.

-u, --unbuffered

This option exists for POSIX-compliance reasons ('u' is for
'unbuffered'). The output is always unbuffered - this option
is simply ignored.

-h, --help

Print this help message.

-V, --version

Show version information.

POSITIONAL ARGUMENTS

<FILE>...

Files to print and concatenate. Use a dash ('-') or no
argument at all to read from standard input.

SUBCOMMANDS

cache - Modify the syntax-definition and theme cache.

FILES

bat can also be customized with a configuration file. The location of
the file is dependent on your operating system. To get the default
path for your system, call:

bat --config-file

Alternatively, you can use the BAT_CONFIG_PATH environment variable
to point bat to a non-default location of the configuration file.

To generate a default configuration file, call:

bat --generate-config-file

ADDING CUSTOM LANGUAGES

bat supports Sublime Text .sublime-syntax language files, and can be
customized to add additional languages to your local installation. To
do this, add the .sublime-syntax language files to `$(bat --config-
dir)/syntaxes` and run `bat cache --build`.

Example:

mkdir -p "$(bat --config-dir)/syntaxes"
cd "$(bat --config-dir)/syntaxes"

# Put new '.sublime-syntax' language definition files
# in this folder (or its subdirectories), for example:
git clone https://github.com/tellnobody1/sublime-purescript-
syntax

# And then build the cache.
bat cache --build

Once the cache is built, the new language will be visible in `bat
--list-languages`.
If you ever want to remove the custom languages, you can clear the
cache with `bat cache --clear`.

ADDING CUSTOM THEMES

Similarly to custom languages, bat supports Sublime Text .tmTheme
themes. These can be installed to `$(bat --config-dir)/themes`, and
are added to the cache with `bat cache --build`.

INPUT PREPROCESSOR

Much like less(1) does, bat supports input preprocessors via the
LESSOPEN and LESSCLOSE environment variables. In addition, bat
attempts to be as compatible with less's preprocessor implementation
as possible.

To use the preprocessor, call:

bat --lessopen

Alternatively, the preprocessor may be enabled by default by adding
the '--lessopen' option to the configuration file.

To temporarily disable the preprocessor if it is enabled by default,
call:

bat --no-lessopen

For more information, see the "INPUT PREPROCESSOR" section of
less(1).

MORE INFORMATION

For more information and up-to-date documentation, visit the bat
repo:
https://github.com/sharkdp/bat

BAT(1)