M4(1)				 User Commands				 M4(1)



NAME
       M4 - manual page for M4 1.4.5

SYNOPSIS
       m4 [OPTION]... [FILE]...

DESCRIPTION
       Mandatory  or  optional	arguments  to  long  options  are mandatory or
       optional for short options too.

   Operation modes:
       --help display this help and exit

       --version
	      output version information and exit

       -E, --fatal-warnings
	      stop execution after first warning

       -e, --interactive
	      unbuffer output, ignore interrupts

       -P, --prefix-builtins
	      force a 'm4_' prefix to all builtins

       -Q, --quiet, --silent
	      suppress some warnings for builtins

   Preprocessor features:
       -D, --define=NAME[=VALUE]
	      enter NAME has having VALUE, or empty

       -I, --include=DIRECTORY
	      append this directory to include path

       -s, --synclines
	      generate '#line NO "FILE"' lines

       -U, --undefine=NAME
	      delete builtin NAME

   Limits control:
       -G, --traditional
	      suppress all GNU extensions

       -H, --hashsize=PRIME
	      set symbol lookup hash table size [509]

       -L, --nesting-limit=NUMBER
	      change artificial nesting limit [1024]

   Frozen state files:
       -F, --freeze-state=FILE
	      produce a frozen state on FILE at end

       -R, --reload-state=FILE
	      reload a frozen state from FILE at start

   Debugging:
       -d, --debug[=FLAGS]
	      set debug level (no FLAGS implies 'aeq')

       -l, --arglength=NUM
	      restrict macro tracing size

       -o, --error-output=FILE
	      redirect debug and trace output

       -t, --trace=NAME
	      trace NAME when it will be defined

   FLAGS is any of:
       a      show actual arguments

       c      show before collect, after collect and after call

       e      show expansion

       f      say current input file name

       i      show changes in input files

       l      say current input line number

       p      show results of path searches

       q      quote values as necessary, with a or e flag

       t      trace for all macro calls, not only traceon'ed

       V      shorthand for all of the other flags

       x      add a unique macro call id, useful with c flag

       If defined, the environment variable 'M4PATH' is a colon-separated list
       of directories included after any specified by '-I'.

       If no FILE or if FILE is '-', standard input is read.

       Exit  status  is	 0  for	 success, 1 for failure, or whatever value was
       passed to the m4exit macro.

AUTHOR
       Written by Rene' Seindal.

COPYRIGHT
       Copyright (C) 2006 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
       This is free software; see the source for copying conditions.  There is
       NO  warranty;  not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR
       PURPOSE.

SEE ALSO
       The full documentation for M4 is maintained as a	 Texinfo  manual.   If
       the  info and M4 programs are properly installed at your site, the com-
       mand

	      info M4

       should give you access to the complete manual.



M4 1.4.5			   July 2006				 M4(1)