The Open Group Base Specifications Issue 6
IEEE Std 1003.1, 2004 Edition
Copyright © 2001-2004 The IEEE and The Open Group, All Rights reserved.

NAME

exit - cause the shell to exit

SYNOPSIS

exit [n]

DESCRIPTION

The exit utility shall cause the shell to exit with the exit status specified by the unsigned decimal integer n. If n is specified, but its value is not between 0 and 255 inclusively, the exit status is undefined.

A trap on EXIT shall be executed before the shell terminates, except when the exit utility is invoked in that trap itself, in which case the shell shall exit immediately.

OPTIONS

None.

OPERANDS

See the DESCRIPTION.

STDIN

Not used.

INPUT FILES

None.

ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES

None.

ASYNCHRONOUS EVENTS

Default.

STDOUT

Not used.

STDERR

The standard error shall be used only for diagnostic messages.

OUTPUT FILES

None.

EXTENDED DESCRIPTION

None.

EXIT STATUS

The exit status shall be n, if specified. Otherwise, the value shall be the exit value of the last command executed, or zero if no command was executed. When exit is executed in a trap action, the last command is considered to be the command that executed immediately preceding the trap action.

CONSEQUENCES OF ERRORS

Default.


The following sections are informative.

APPLICATION USAGE

None.

EXAMPLES

Exit with a true value:

exit 0

Exit with a false value:

exit 1

RATIONALE

As explained in other sections, certain exit status values have been reserved for special uses and should be used by applications only for those purposes:

 126
A file to be executed was found, but it was not an executable utility.
 127
A utility to be executed was not found.
>128
A command was interrupted by a signal.

FUTURE DIRECTIONS

None.

SEE ALSO

Special Built-In Utilities

CHANGE HISTORY

Issue 6

IEEE Std 1003.1-2001/Cor 1-2002, item XCU/TC1/D6/5 is applied so that the reference page sections use terms as described in the Utility Description Defaults ( Utility Description Defaults ). No change in behavior is intended.

End of informative text.

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