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basename

From Quire, the open reference·Shell command for extracting the last name from a path·1 min read
basename
ReleaseJanuary 1979
Written inC
Operating systemUnix, Unix-like, IBM i, Plan 9, Inferno
PlatformCross-platform
TypeCommand
Licensecoreutils: GPLv3+
Plan 9: MIT License

basename is a shell command for extracting the last name of a file path.

The command was introduced in X/Open Portability Guidelines issue 2 of 1987. It was inherited into the first version of POSIX and the Single Unix Specification.[1] It first appeared in 4.4BSD.[2] The version in GNU Core Utilities was written by David MacKenzie.[3] The command is available for Windows as part of the GnuWin32 project[4] and UnxUtils[5] and is in IBM i.[6]

Use#edit

The Single UNIX Specification is: basename path [suffix]. The required argument, path, is a file path string. The second argument, which is optional, is text to remove from the end of the last name if it ends with the text.

Examples#edit

The command reports the last part of a path ignoring any trailing slashes.

$ basename /path/to/filename.ext 
filename.ext

$ basename /path/to/
to

If the suffix argument is included and matches the end of the last name, then that text is removed from the result.

$ basename /path/to/filename.ext .ext
filename

$ basename /path/to/filename.ext xx
filename.ext

See also#edit

References#edit

  1. ^ basename – Shell and Utilities Reference, The Single UNIX Specification, Version 5 from The Open Group
  2. ^ basename(1) – FreeBSD General Commands Manual
  3. ^ basename(1) – Linux User Manual – User Commands from Manned.org
  4. ^ "CoreUtils for Windows". Archived from the original on 2025-07-30. Retrieved 2025-08-09.
  5. ^ "Native Win32 ports of some GNU utilities". Archived from the original on 2006-02-09. Retrieved 2020-07-25.
  6. ^ IBM. "IBM System i Version 7.2 Programming Qshell" (PDF). IBM. Archived (PDF) from the original on 2020-09-18. Retrieved 2020-09-05.
Categories Standard Unix programsUnix SUS2008 utilitiesIBM i Qshell commandsPlan 9 commandsInferno (operating system) commands

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