---
name: "humanfriendly"
section: "1"
platform: "linux"
package: "humanfriendly"
version: "10.0-6"
release: "Debian 13 (Trixie)"
platforms: ["linux"]
url: "https://new.carta.tech/humanfriendly"
---

# humanfriendly(1)

human friendly input/output formatter

## NAME

humanfriendly - human friendly input/output formatter

## SYNOPSIS

**humanfriendly** \[*options*\]\

## DESCRIPTION

**humanfriendly** is a program that performs human friendly input/output (text formatting) on the command line.

## OPTIONS

This program follow the usual GNU command line syntax, with long options starting with two dashes (\`-').  A summary of options is included below.

- **-h, --help**

  Show this message and exit.

- **-c *COMMAND*, --run-command *COMMAND***

  Execute an external *COMMAND* (given as the positional arguments) and render a spinner and timer while the command is running. The exit status of the command is propagated.

- **--format-table**

  Read tabular data from standard input (each line is a row and each whitespace separated field is a column), format the data as a table and print the resulting table to standard output. See also the **--delimiter** option.

- **-d *VALUE*, --delimiter=*VALUE***

  Change the delimiter used by **--format-table** to *VALUE* (a string). By default all whitespace is treated as a delimiter.

- **-l *LENGTH*, --format-length=*LENGTH***

  Convert a length count (given as the integer or float *LENGTH*) into a human readable string and print that string to standard output.

- **-n *VALUE*, --format-number=*VALUE***

  Format a number (given as the integer or floating point number *VALUE*) with thousands separators and two decimal places (if needed) and print the formatted number to standard output.

- **-s *BYTES*, --format-size=*BYTES***

  Convert a byte count (given as the integer *BYTES*) into a human readable string and print that string to standard output.

- **-t *SECONDS*, --format-timespan=*SECONDS***

  Convert a number of seconds (given as the floating point number *SECONDS*) into a human readable timespan and print that string to standard output.

- **--parse-size=*VALUE***

  Parse a human readable data size (given as the string *VALUE*) and print the number of bytes to standard output.

- **--parse-length=*VALUE***

  Parse a human readable data length (given as the string *VALUE*) and print the number of bytes to standard output.