Menu
Escape character (\) can be used to escape end of line, e.g.
% echo This could be \
a very \
long line\!
This could be a very long line!
%
however, isn't end of line (new line) represented by \n which has two characters. shouldn't the result of the escape be the literal of \n. e.g.
%echo $'\\n'
\n
%
Thank you for your answer!
Edit:
Sorry, I didn't explain it well enough. I am not trying to echo a new line. I am wondering why \ is able to new line character (\n) which has two character instead of just escape the backslash in the new line character and produce the literal of \n
288
use ctrl-v ctrl-m key combos twice to insert two newline control character in the terminal. Ctrl-v lets you insert control characters into the terminal. You could use the enter or return key instead of the ctrol-m if you like. It inserts the same thing.
If you want to break up a command so that it fits on more than one line, use a backslash (\) as the last character on the line. Bash will print the continuation prompt, usually a >, to indicate that this is a continuation of the previous line. $ printf "%s\n" "This is a very long printf.
A non-quoted backslash, \, is used as an escape character in Bash. It preserves the literal value of the next character that follows, with the exception of newline.
Newline is the name given in the UNIX world to a character that ends a line in a line-oriented file (or in a terminal). In the UNIX/Linux world this corresponds to the ASCII linefeed character.
Different systems use different conventions to end lines: Windows uses a sequence of carriage return and line feed, while Mac originally used a single carriage return. This confusion stems from the fact that these were originally commands needed to move a printer's print head to the beginning of a new line.
\n is a conventional way of expressing the end of line character in code, again originally in the UNIX world, more precisely in the C language. Note that when reading a text file C reads a single newline character even on systems where this is really a two character sequence.
39
Actually, \n is not really a newline character -- it is an escape sequence that represents a newline (which is just one character in Linux). The \ at the end of a line escapes the actual newline character that you type in using the enter key. You can look at what ASCII values represent different characters using hexdump:
%echo $'\\n'
\n
%echo $'\\n' | hexdump -C
00000000 5c 6e 0a |\n.|
00000003
You will notice that echo printed out 3 characters: \ (5c), n (6e), and a newline (0a). You will also notice that on the right hand side of the hexdump output, newline shows up as a ".", because it is considered a non-printing character.
141
If you love us? You can donate to us via Paypal or buy me a coffee so we can maintain and grow! Thank you!
Donate Us With
