INDENT(1)                  OpenBSD Reference Manual                  INDENT(1)

NAME
     indent - indent and format C program source

SYNOPSIS
     indent input-file [output-file] [-bad | -nbad] [-bap | -nbap]
            [-bbb | -nbbb] [-bc | -nbc] [-bl | -br] [-cn] [-cdn]
            [-cdb | -ncdb] [-ce | -nce] [-cin] [-clin] [-dn] [-din]
            [-dj | -ndj] [-ei | -nei] [-fc1 | -nfc1] [-in] [-ip | -nip] [-ln]
            [-lcn] [-lp | -nlp] [-npro] [-pcs | -npcs] [-psl | -npsl]
            [-sc | -nsc] [-sob | -nsob] [-st] [-Ttypename] [-troff] [-v | -nv]

DESCRIPTION
     indent is a C program formatter.  It reformats the C program in the
     input-file according to the switches.  The switches which can be speci-
     fied are described below.  They may appear before or after the file
     names.

     NOTE: If you only specify an input-file, the formatting is done ``in-
     place'', that is, the formatted file is written back into input-file and
     a backup copy of input-file is written in the current directory.  If
     input-file is named /blah/blah/file, the backup file is named file.BAK.
     If file.BAK exists, it is overwritten.

     If output-file is specified, indent checks to make sure it is different
     from input-file.

     The options listed below control the formatting style imposed by indent.

     -bad, -nbad     If -bad is specified, a blank line is forced after every
                     block of declarations.  Default: -nbad.

     -bap, -nbap     If -bap is specified, a blank line is forced after every
                     procedure body.  Default: -nbap.  Note: This option cur-
                     rently has no effect.

     -bbb, -nbbb     If -bbb is specified, a blank line is forced before every
                     block comment.  Default: -nbbb.

     -bc, -nbc       If -bc is specified, then a newline is forced after each
                     comma in a declaration.  -nbc turns off this option.  The
                     default is -nbc.

     -bl, -br        Specifying -bl lines up compound statements like this:

                           if (...)
                           {
                             code
                           }

                     Specifying -br (the default) makes them look like this:

                           if (...) {
                             code
                           }

     -cn             The column in which comments on code start.  The default
                     is 33.

     -cdn            The column in which comments on declarations start.  The
                     default is for these comments to start in the same column
                     as those on code.

     -cdb, -ncdb     Enables (disables) the placement of comment delimiters on
                     blank lines.  With this option enabled, comments look
                     like this:

                           /*
                            * this is a comment
                            */

                     Rather than like this:

                           /* this is a comment */

                     This only affects block comments, not comments to the
                     right of code.  The default is -cdb.

     -ce, -nce       Enables (disables) forcing  ``else''s to cuddle up to the
                     immediately preceding `}'.  The default is -ce.

     -cin            Sets the continuation indent to be n.  Continuation lines
                     will be indented that far from the beginning of the first
                     line of the statement.  Parenthesized expressions have
                     extra indentation added to indicate the nesting, unless
                     -lp is in effect.  -ci defaults to the same value as -i.

     -clin           Causes case labels to be indented n tab stops to the
                     right of the containing switch statement.  -cli0.5 causes
                     case labels to be indented half a tab stop.  The default
                     is -cli0.

     -dn             Controls the placement of comments which are not to the
                     right of code.  Specifying -d1 means that such comments
                     are placed one indentation level to the left of code.
                     The default, -d0, lines up these comments with the code.
                     See the section on comment indentation below.

     -din            Specifies the indentation, in character positions, from a
                     declaration keyword to the following identifier.  The de-
                     fault is -di16.

     -dj, -ndj       -dj left justifies declarations.  -ndj indents declara-
                     tions the same as code.  The default is -ndj.

     -ei, -nei       Enables (disables) special else-if processing.  If it's
                     enabled, an if following an else will have the same in-
                     dentation as the preceding if statement.  The default is
                     -ei.

     -fc1, -nfc1     Enables (disables) the formatting of comments that start
                     in column 1.  Often, comments whose leading `/' is in
                     column 1 have been carefully formatted by the programmer.
                     In such cases, -nfc1 should be used.  The default is
                     -fc1.

     -in             The number of spaces for one indentation level.  The de-
                     fault is 8.

     -ip, -nip       Enables (disables) the indentation of parameter declara-
                     tions from the left margin.  The default is -ip.  Note:
                     This option currently has no effect.

     -ln             Maximum length of an output line.  The default is 75.
                     Note: This option currently has no effect.

     -lcn            Specify a column width for comments.

     -lp, -nlp       Lines up code surrounded by parentheses in continuation
                     lines.  If a line has a left parenthesis which is not
                     closed on that line, then continuation lines will be
                     lined up to start at the character position just after
                     the left parenthesis.  For example, here is how a piece
                     of continued code looks with -nlp in effect:

                           p1 = first_procedure(second_procedure(p2, p3),
                             third_procedure(p4,p5));

                     With -lp in effect (the default) the code looks somewhat
                     clearer:

                           p1 = first_procedure(second_procedure(p2, p3),
                                                third_procedure(p4,p5));

                     Inserting two more newlines we get:

                           p1 = first_procedure(second_procedure(p2,
                                                                 p3),
                                                third_procedure(p4,
                                                                p5));

                     The default is -lp.

     -npro           Causes the profile files, ./.indent.pro and
                     ~/.indent.pro, to be ignored.

     -pcs, -npcs     If true (-pcs) all procedure calls will have a space in-
                     serted between the name and the `('.  The default is
                     -npcs.

     -psl, -npsl     If true (-psl) the names of procedures being defined are
                     placed in column 1 - their types, if any, will be left on
                     the previous lines.  The default is -psl.

     -sc, -nsc       Enables (disables) the placement of asterisks (`*') at
                     the left edge of all comments.  The default is -sc.

     -sob, -nsob     If -sob is specified, indent will swallow optional blank
                     lines.  You can use this to get rid of blank lines after
                     declarations.  Default: -nsob.  Note: This option cur-
                     rently has no effect.

     -st             Causes indent to take its input from stdin, and put its
                     output to stdout.

     -Ttypename      Adds typename to the list of type keywords.  Names accu-
                     mulate: -T can be specified more than once.  You need to
                     specify all the typenames that appear in your program
                     that are defined by typedef - nothing will be harmed if
                     you miss a few, but the program won't be formatted as
                     nicely as it should.  This sounds like a painful thing to
                     have to do, but it's really a symptom of a problem in C:
                     typedef causes a syntactic change in the language and
                     indent can't find all instances of typedef.

     -troff          Causes indent to format the program for processing by
                     troff(1).  It will produce a fancy listing in much the
                     same spirit as vgrind(1).  If the output file is not
                     specified, the default is standard output, rather than
                     formatting in place.

     -v, -nv         -v turns on ``verbose'' mode; -nv turns it off.  When in
                     verbose mode, indent reports when it splits one line of
                     input into two or more lines of output, and gives some
                     size statistics at completion.  The default is -nv.

     You may set up your own ``profile'' of defaults to indent by creating a
     file called .indent.pro in your login directory and/or the current direc-
     tory and including whatever switches you like.  An .indent.pro file in
     the current directory takes precedence over the one in your login direc-
     tory.  If indent is run and a profile file exists, then it is read to set
     up the program's defaults.  Switches on the command line, though, always
     override profile switches.  The switches should be separated by spaces,
     tabs or newlines.

   Comments
     `Box' comments.  indent assumes that any comment with a dash, star, or
     newline immediately after the start of comment (that is, `/*-', `/**', or
     `/*' followed immediately by a newline character) is a comment surrounded
     by a box of stars.  Each line of such a comment is left unchanged, except
     that its indentation may be adjusted to account for the change in inden-
     tation of the first line of the comment.

     Straight text.  All other comments are treated as straight text.  indent
     fits as many words (separated by blanks, tabs, or newlines) on a line as
     possible.  Blank lines break paragraphs.

   Comment indentation
     If a comment is on a line with code it is started in the ``comment
     column'', which is set by the -cn command line parameter.  Otherwise, the
     comment is started at n indentation levels less than where code is cur-
     rently being placed, where n is specified by the -dn command line parame-
     ter.  If the code on a line extends past the comment column, the comment
     starts further to the right, and the right margin may be automatically
     extended in extreme cases.

   Preprocessor lines
     In general, indent leaves preprocessor lines alone.  The only reformat-
     ting that it will do is to straighten up trailing comments.  It leaves
     embedded comments alone.  Conditional compilation (#ifdef...#endif) is
     recognized and indent attempts to correctly compensate for the syntactic
     peculiarities introduced.

   C syntax
     indent understands a substantial amount about the syntax of C, but it has
     a ``forgiving'' parser.  It attempts to cope with the usual sorts of in-
     complete and misformed syntax.  In particular, the use of macros like:

           #define forever for(;;)

     is handled properly.

ENVIRONMENT
     HOME    Used to locate the full path to ~/.indent.pro.

FILES
     ./.indent.pro  profile file
     ~/.indent.pro  profile file

HISTORY
     The indent command appeared in 4.2BSD.

BUGS
     indent has even more switches than ls(1).

     A common mistake is to try to indent all the C programs in a directory by
     typing:

           $ indent *.c

     This is probably a bug, not a feature.

OpenBSD 4.7                      May 29, 2009                                4
