---
name: "deal"
section: "6"
platform: "linux"
package: "deal"
version: "3.1.9-13"
release: "Debian 13 (Trixie)"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/deal"
---

# deal(6)

bridge hand generator

## NAME

deal - bridge hand generator

## SYNOPSIS

**deal** \[ -ltv \] \[ -e expr \] \[ -i condition file \] \[ -I format \] \[ -s seed \] \[ -\[NSEW\] hand-spec \] \[ count \]

## DESCRIPTION

**deal** is a program to generate bridge hands.

## OPTIONS

- **-l**

  Write deals in a "single-line" format.

- **-t**

  Print distribution table and exit. The distribution table is an ordered list of all possible hand patterns for a single hand.

- **-v**

  Be verbose, print sample count.

- **-e expr**

  Evaluate the Tcl expression expr.

- **-i condition file**

  File that defines the hand type to generate or the output format. (Can be given multiple times.)

- **-I format**

  Read hands from stdin. Formats available are: ddline, giblib, line, pbn, smartstack. You might deal, say, 10,000 hands which satisfy specific criteria, saving them to a file. Then you can use that output for input with deal -I to find out which hands satisfy other constraints.

- **-s seed**

  Initialize random generator with **seed**.

- **-\[NSEW\] hand-spec**

  Specifies the cards held by the specified hand. The hand-spec should be of the form: "AK8532 - KQ72 A65". Voids must be represented with a '-' character. hand-spec should be one argument, so the string should be quoted on the command line.

- **count**

  Number of hands to generate, default is 10.

## SEE ALSO

**/usr/share/doc/deal/html,** **/usr/share/deal.**

## AUTHOR

deal was written by Thomas Andrews \<deal@thomaso.best.vwh.net\>.

This manual page was written by Christoph Berg \<cb@df7cb.de\>, for the Debian project (but may be used by others).