pcre-config(1)

pcre-config1

Program to return pcre configuration

Usage

pcre-config [--prefix] [--exec-prefix] [--version] [--libs] [--libs16] [--libs32] [--libs-cpp] [--libs-posix] [--cflags] [--cflags-posix]

Overview

pcre-config returns the configuration of the installed PCRE libraries and the options required to compile a program to use them. Some of the options apply only to the 8-bit, or 16-bit, or 32-bit libraries, respectively, and are not available if only one of those libraries has been built. If an unavailable option is encountered, the "usage" information is output.

Options

--prefix

Writes the directory prefix used in the PCRE installation for architecture independent files (/usr on many systems, /usr/local on some systems) to the standard output.

--exec-prefix

Writes the directory prefix used in the PCRE installation for architecture dependent files (normally the same as --prefix) to the standard output.

--version

Writes the version number of the installed PCRE libraries to the standard output.

--libs

Writes to the standard output the command line options required to link with the 8-bit PCRE library (-lpcre on many systems).

--libs16

Writes to the standard output the command line options required to link with the 16-bit PCRE library (-lpcre16 on many systems).

--libs32

Writes to the standard output the command line options required to link with the 32-bit PCRE library (-lpcre32 on many systems).

--libs-cpp

Writes to the standard output the command line options required to link with PCRE's C++ wrapper library (-lpcrecpp -lpcre on many systems).

--libs-posix

Writes to the standard output the command line options required to link with PCRE's POSIX API wrapper library (-lpcreposix -lpcre on many systems).

--cflags

Writes to the standard output the command line options required to compile files that use PCRE (this may include some -I options, but is blank on many systems).

--cflags-posix

Writes to the standard output the command line options required to compile files that use PCRE's POSIX API wrapper library (this may include some -I options, but is blank on many systems).

Revision

Last updated: 24 June 2012

Releases

12 releases since Debian 3.0 (Woody); the text changed 2 times.

  1. 3.0–5.0
  2. 6.0–12
  3. Arch

--libs-cpp since Arch Linux 2026-11-01; --libs16 since Arch Linux 2026-11-01; --libs32 since Arch Linux 2026-11-01; --version since Debian 6.0 (Squeeze).

Author

This manual page was originally written by Mark Baker for the Debian GNU/Linux system. It has been subsequently revised as a generic PCRE man page.

From pcre 8.45-5 in Arch Linux 2026-11-01. Parsed by carta from the page's man source.