c

cd(1)

cd(1)

NAME

cd - change working directory

SYNOPSIS

cd [ directory ]

DESCRIPTION

If directory is not speci®ed, the value of shell parameter HOME is used as the new working directory. If directory speci®es a complete path starting with /, ., or .., directory becomes the new working directory. If neither case applies, cd tries to ®nd the designated directory relative to one of the paths speci®ed by the CDPATH shell variable. CDPATH has the same syntax as, and similar semantics to, the PATH shell vari- able. cd must have execute (search) permission in directory.

cd exists only as a shell built-in command because a new process is created whenever a command is exe- cuted, making cd useless if written and processed as a normal system command. Moreover, different shells provide different implementations of cd as a built-in utility. Features of cd as described here may not be supported by all the shells. Refer to individual shell manual entries for differences.

If cd is called in a subshell or a separate utility execution environment such as:

find . -type d -exec cd {}; -exec foo {};

(which invokes foo on accessible directories) cd does not affect the current directory of the caller's environment. Another usage of cd as a stand-alone command is to obtain the exit status of the command.

EXTERNAL INFLUENCES

International Code Set Support

Single- and multi-byte character code sets are supported.

EXAMPLES

Change the current working directory to the HOME directory from any location in the ®le system:

cd

Change to new current working directory foo residing in the current directory:

cd foo

or

cd ./foo

Change to directory foobar residing in the current directory's parent directory:

cd ../foobar

Change to the directory whose absolute pathname is /usr/local/lib/work.files:

cd /usr/local/lib/work.files

Change to the directory proj1/schedule/staffing/proposals relative to home directory:

cd $HOME/proj1/schedule/staffing/proposals

VARIABLES

The following environment variables affect the execution of cd:

HOME

The name of the home directory, used when no directory operand is speci®ed.

CDPATH

A colon-separated list of pathnames that refer to directories. If the directory operand

 

does not begin with a slash (/) character, and the ®rst component is not dot or dot-

 

dot, cd searches for directory relative to each directory named in the CDPATH vari-

 

able, in the order listed. The new working directory is set to the ®rst matching direc-

 

tory found. An empty string in place of a directory pathname represents the current

 

directory. If CDPATH is not set, it is treated as if it was an empty string.

RETURN VALUE

 

Upon completion,

cd exits with one of the following values:

Section 1−66

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HP-UX Release 11i: December 2000