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NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | OPTIONS | SIGNALS | ENVIRONMENT | NOTES | HISTORY | BUGS | SEE ALSO | REPORTING BUGS | AVAILABILITY |
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SCRIPT(1) User Commands SCRIPT(1)
script - make typescript of terminal session
script [options] [file] [-- command [argument...]]
script makes a typescript of everything on your terminal session.
The terminal data are stored in raw form to the log file and
information about timing to another (optional) structured log
file. The timing log file is necessary to replay the session later
by scriptreplay(1) and to store additional information about the
session.
Since version 2.35, script supports multiple streams and allows
the logging of input and output to separate files or all the one
file. This version also supports a new timing file which records
additional information. The command scriptreplay --summary then
provides all the information.
If the argument file or option --log-out file is given, script
saves the dialogue in this file. If no filename is given, the
dialogue is saved in the file typescript.
Note that logging input using --log-in or --log-io may record
security-sensitive information as the log file contains all
terminal session input (e.g., passwords) independently of the
terminal echo flag setting.
Below, the size argument may be followed by the multiplicative
suffixes KiB (=1024), MiB (=1024*1024), and so on for GiB, TiB,
PiB, EiB, ZiB and YiB (the "iB" is optional, e.g., "K" has the
same meaning as "KiB"), or the suffixes KB (=1000), MB
(=1000*1000), and so on for GB, TB, PB, EB, ZB and YB.
-a, --append
Append the output to file or to typescript, retaining the
prior contents.
-c, --command command
Run the command rather than an interactive shell. This makes
it easy for a script to capture the output of a program that
behaves differently when its stdout is not a tty. Instead of
using option -c, the command may also be specified after a
double dash (--).
-E, --echo when
This option controls the ECHO flag for the slave end of the
session’s pseudoterminal. The supported modes are always,
never, or auto.
The default is auto — in this case, ECHO enabled for the
pseudoterminal slave; if the current standard input is a
terminal, ECHO is disabled for it to prevent double echo; if
the current standard input is not a terminal (for example
pipe: echo date | script) then keeping ECHO enabled for the
pseudoterminal slave enables the standard input data to be
viewed on screen while being recorded to session log
simultaneously.
Note that 'never' mode affects content of the session output
log, because users input is not repeated on output.
-e, --return
Return the exit status of the child process. Uses the same
format as bash termination on signal termination (i.e., exit
status is 128 + the signal number). The exit status of the
child process is always stored in the type script file too.
-f, --flush
Flush output after each write. This is nice for
telecooperation: one person does mkfifo foo; script -f foo,
and another can supervise in real-time what is being done
using cat foo. Note that flush has an impact on performance;
it’s possible to use SIGUSR1 to flush logs on demand.
--force
Allow the default output file typescript to be a hard or
symbolic link. The command will follow a symbolic link.
-B, --log-io file
Log input and output to the same file. Note, this option makes
sense only if --log-timing is also specified, otherwise it’s
impossible to separate output and input streams from the log
file.
-I, --log-in file
Log input to the file. The log output is disabled if only
--log-in specified.
Use this logging functionality carefully as it logs all input,
including input when terminal has disabled echo flag (for
example, password inputs).
-O, --log-out file
Log output to the file. The default is to log output to the
file with name typescript if the option --log-out or --log-in
is not given. The log output is disabled if only --log-in
specified.
-T, --log-timing file
Log timing information to the file. Two timing file formats
are supported now. The classic format is used when only one
stream (input or output) logging is enabled. The multi-stream
format is used on --log-io or when --log-in and --log-out are
used together. See also --logging-format.
-m, --logging-format format
Force use of advanced or classic timing log format. The
default is the classic format to log only output and the
advanced format when input as well as output logging is
requested.
Classic format
The timing log contains two fields, separated by a space.
The first field indicates how much time elapsed since the
previous output. The second field indicates how many
characters were output this time.
Advanced (multi-stream) format
The first field is an entry type identifier ('I’nput,
'O’utput, 'H’eader, 'S’ignal). The second field is how
much time elapsed since the previous entry, and the rest
of the entry is type-specific data.
-o, --output-limit size
Limit the size of the typescript and timing files to size and
stop the child process after this size is exceeded. The
calculated file size does not include the start and done
messages that the script command prepends and appends to the
child process output. Due to buffering, the resulting output
file might be larger than the specified value.
-q, --quiet
Be quiet (do not write start and done messages to standard
output).
-t[file], --timing[=file]
Output timing data to standard error, or to file when given.
This option is deprecated in favour of --log-timing where the
file argument is not optional.
-h, --help
Display help text and exit.
-V, --version
Display version and exit.
Upon receiving SIGUSR1, script immediately flushes the output
files.
The following environment variable is utilized by script:
SHELL
If the variable SHELL exists, the shell forked by script will
be that shell. If SHELL is not set, the Bourne shell is
assumed. (Most shells set this variable automatically).
The script ends when the forked shell exits (a control-D for the
Bourne shell (sh(1p)), and exit, logout or control-d (if ignoreeof
is not set) for the C-shell, csh(1)).
Certain interactive commands, such as vi(1), create garbage in the
typescript file. script works best with commands that do not
manipulate the screen, the results are meant to emulate a hardcopy
terminal.
It is not recommended to run script in non-interactive shells. The
inner shell of script is always interactive, and this could lead
to unexpected results. If you use script in the shell
initialization file, you have to avoid entering an infinite loop.
You can use for example the .profile file, which is read by login
shells only:
if test -t 0 ; then
script
exit
fi
You should also avoid use of script in command pipes, as script
can read more input than you would expect.
The script command appeared in 3.0BSD.
script places everything in the log file, including linefeeds and
backspaces. This is not what the naive user expects.
script is primarily designed for interactive terminal sessions.
When stdin is not a terminal (for example: echo foo | script),
then the session can hang, because the interactive shell within
the script session misses EOF and script has no clue when to close
the session. See the NOTES section for more information.
csh(1) (for the history mechanism), scriptreplay(1), scriptlive(1)
For bug reports, use the issue tracker
<https://github.com/util-linux/util-linux/issues>.
The script command is part of the util-linux package which can be
downloaded from Linux Kernel Archive
<https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/>. This page is
part of the util-linux (a random collection of Linux utilities)
project. Information about the project can be found at
⟨https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/⟩. If you have a
bug report for this manual page, send it to
util-linux@vger.kernel.org. This page was obtained from the
project's upstream Git repository
⟨git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/utils/util-linux/util-linux.git⟩ on
2025-08-11. (At that time, the date of the most recent commit that
was found in the repository was 2025-08-05.) If you discover any
rendering problems in this HTML version of the page, or you
believe there is a better or more up-to-date source for the page,
or you have corrections or improvements to the information in this
COLOPHON (which is not part of the original manual page), send a
mail to man-pages@man7.org
util-linux 2.42-start-521-ec46 2025-08-09 SCRIPT(1)
Pages that refer to this page: scriptlive(1), scriptreplay(1), pty(7), e2fsck(8)
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HTML rendering created 2025-09-06 by Michael Kerrisk, author of The Linux Programming Interface. For details of in-depth Linux/UNIX system programming training courses that I teach, look here. Hosting by jambit GmbH. |
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