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NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | OPTIONS | SEE ALSO | COPYRIGHT | COLOPHON |
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STRINGS(1) GNU Development Tools STRINGS(1)
strings - print the sequences of printable characters in files
strings [-afovV] [-min-len]
[-n min-len] [--bytes=min-len]
[-t radix] [--radix=radix]
[-e encoding] [--encoding=encoding]
[-U method] [--unicode=method]
[-] [--all] [--print-file-name]
[-T bfdname] [--target=bfdname]
[-w] [--include-all-whitespace]
[-s] [--output-separator sep_string]
[--help] [--version] file...
For each file given, GNU strings prints the printable character
sequences that are at least 4 characters long (or the number given
with the options below) and are followed by an unprintable
character.
Depending upon how the strings program was configured it will
default to either displaying all the printable sequences that it
can find in each file, or only those sequences that are in
loadable, initialized data sections. If the file type is
unrecognizable, or if strings is reading from stdin then it will
always display all of the printable sequences that it can find.
For backwards compatibility any file that occurs after a
command-line option of just - will also be scanned in full,
regardless of the presence of any -d option.
strings is mainly useful for determining the contents of non-text
files.
-a
--all
- Scan the whole file, regardless of what sections it contains
or whether those sections are loaded or initialized. Normally
this is the default behaviour, but strings can be configured
so that the -d is the default instead.
The - option is position dependent and forces strings to
perform full scans of any file that is mentioned after the -
on the command line, even if the -d option has been specified.
-d
--data
Only print strings from initialized, loaded data sections in
the file. This may reduce the amount of garbage in the
output, but it also exposes the strings program to any
security flaws that may be present in the BFD library used to
scan and load sections. Strings can be configured so that
this option is the default behaviour. In such cases the -a
option can be used to avoid using the BFD library and instead
just print all of the strings found in the file.
-f
--print-file-name
Print the name of the file before each string.
--help
Print a summary of the program usage on the standard output
and exit.
-min-len
-n min-len
--bytes=min-len
Print sequences of displayable characters that are at least
min-len characters long. If not specified a default minimum
length of 4 is used. The distinction between displayable and
non-displayable characters depends upon the setting of the -e
and -U options. Sequences are always terminated at control
characters such as new-line and carriage-return, but not the
tab character.
-o Like -t o. Some other versions of strings have -o act like -t
d instead. Since we can not be compatible with both ways, we
simply chose one.
-t radix
--radix=radix
Print the offset within the file before each string. The
single character argument specifies the radix of the
offset---o for octal, x for hexadecimal, or d for decimal.
-e encoding
--encoding=encoding
Select the character encoding of the strings that are to be
found. Possible values for encoding are: s =
single-7-bit-byte characters (default), S = single-8-bit-byte
characters, b = 16-bit bigendian, l = 16-bit littleendian, B =
32-bit bigendian, L = 32-bit littleendian. Useful for finding
wide character strings. (l and b apply to, for example,
Unicode UTF-16/UCS-2 encodings).
-U [d|i|l|e|x|h]
--unicode=[default|invalid|locale|escape|hex|highlight]
Controls the display of UTF-8 encoded multibyte characters in
strings. The default (--unicode=default) is to give them no
special treatment, and instead rely upon the setting of the
--encoding option. The other values for this option
automatically enable --encoding=S.
The --unicode=invalid option treats them as non-graphic
characters and hence not part of a valid string. All the
remaining options treat them as valid string characters.
The --unicode=locale option displays them in the current
locale, which may or may not support UTF-8 encoding. The
--unicode=hex option displays them as hex byte sequences
enclosed between <> characters. The --unicode=escape option
displays them as escape sequences (\uxxxx) and the
--unicode=highlight option displays them as escape sequences
highlighted in red (if supported by the output device). The
colouring is intended to draw attention to the presence of
unicode sequences where they might not be expected.
-T bfdname
--target=bfdname
Specify an object code format other than your system's default
format.
-v
-V
--version
Print the program version number on the standard output and
exit.
-w
--include-all-whitespace
By default tab and space characters are included in the
strings that are displayed, but other whitespace characters,
such a newlines and carriage returns, are not. The -w option
changes this so that all whitespace characters are considered
to be part of a string.
-s
--output-separator
By default, output strings are delimited by a new-line. This
option allows you to supply any string to be used as the
output record separator. Useful with --include-all-whitespace
where strings may contain new-lines internally.
@file
Read command-line options from file. The options read are
inserted in place of the original @file option. If file does
not exist, or cannot be read, then the option will be treated
literally, and not removed.
Options in file are separated by whitespace. A whitespace
character may be included in an option by surrounding the
entire option in either single or double quotes. Any
character (including a backslash) may be included by prefixing
the character to be included with a backslash. The file may
itself contain additional @file options; any such options will
be processed recursively.
ar(1), nm(1), objdump(1), ranlib(1), readelf(1) and the Info
entries for binutils.
Copyright (c) 1991-2025 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this
document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License,
Version 1.3 or any later version published by the Free Software
Foundation; with no Invariant Sections, with no Front-Cover Texts,
and with no Back-Cover Texts. A copy of the license is included
in the section entitled "GNU Free Documentation License".
This page is part of the binutils (a collection of tools for
working with executable binaries) project. Information about the
project can be found at ⟨http://www.gnu.org/software/binutils/⟩.
If you have a bug report for this manual page, see
⟨http://sourceware.org/bugzilla/enter_bug.cgi?product=binutils⟩.
This page was obtained from the tarball binutils-with-
gold-2.44.tar.gz fetched from ⟨https://ftp.gnu.org/gnu/binutils/⟩
on 2025-08-11. If you discover any rendering problems in this
HTML version of the page, or you believe there is a better or more
up-to-date source for the page, or you have corrections or
improvements to the information in this COLOPHON (which is not
part of the original manual page), send a mail to
[email protected]
binutils-2.44 2025-08-11 STRINGS(1)
Pages that refer to this page: elf(5)
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HTML rendering created 2025-09-06 by Michael Kerrisk, author of The Linux Programming Interface. For details of in-depth Linux/UNIX system programming training courses that I teach, look here. Hosting by jambit GmbH. |
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