EXPAND(1)

📦
version 9.10 · 5 versions
, in ubuntu stonking

💖 EXPAND(1) 💖

okay bestie, gather round, because expand is about to become your new fave and the manual page is expand(1), no cap ✨

🌸 NAME 🌸

expand — convert tabs to spaces 💅

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

expand [OPTION]... [FILE]...

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

so the whole vibe is: convert tabs in each FILE to spaces, and write it all out to standard output. that's it. that's the job. iconic behavior honestly 🎀

With no FILE, or when FILE is -, it reads standard input. (yes bestie, the - means stdin, that's just how we do things around here.)

Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short options too. fr fr, don't skip the required ones 🙈

  • -i, --initial — do not convert tabs after non blanks 👑
  • -t, --tabs=N — have tabs N characters apart, not 8 ✨
  • -t, --tabs=LIST — use comma separated list of tab positions. The last specified position can be prefixed with / to specify a tab size to use after the last explicitly specified tab stop. Also a prefix of + can be used to align remaining tab stops relative to the last specified tab stop instead of the first column 🌈
  • --help — display this help and exit 🫶
  • --version — output version information and exit ⭐

💜 AUTHOR 💜

Written by David MacKenzie. (the original main character, we stan 💐)

🍓 REPORTING BUGS 🍓

Report bugs to: bug-coreutils@gnu.org

GNU coreutils home page: <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>

General help using GNU software: <https://www.gnu.org/gethelp/>

Report any translation bugs to <https://translationproject.org/team/>

ok bestie, if something's broken, TELL THEM. don't just sit there suffering in silence, that's not the energy we're bringing 😭

🧚 SEE ALSO 🧚

Full documentation <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/expand>

or available locally via: info '(coreutils) expand invocation'

Packaged by Ubuntu (9.10-1ubuntu2)

Copyright © 2026 Free Software Foundation, Inc.

License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <https://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.

This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.

There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.

lowkey important: no warranty, to the extent permitted by law. that's not me being dramatic, that's just literally what it says 💀

and that's the whole page bestie!! GNU coreutils 9.10, from August 2026 — EXPAND(1), slay, periodt 💅✨💖

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