highlight (1) - Linux Manuals
highlight: a universal sourcecode to formatted text converter
NAME
Highlight - a universal sourcecode to formatted text converter
SYNOPSIS
highlight [OPTIONS]... [FILES]...DESCRIPTION
Highlight converts sourcecode to HTML, XHTML, RTF, ODT, LaTeX, TeX, BBCode, SVG, XTERM or ANSI escape sequences. There are several colour themes available. Highlight recognizes keywords, numbers, strings, comments, symbols and preprocessor directives. It supports about 160 programming languages, which are defined in Lua scripts.
It's easily possible to enhance highlight's database of programming languages and colour themes. See the README file for details.
General options
- -B, --batch-recursive=<wildcard>
- convert all files matching the wildcard (uses recursive search)
- -D, --data-dir=<path>
- set path to highlight data directory
- --add-config-dir=<path>
- set path to an additional configuration directory
- --config-file=<file>
- set path to a lang or theme file
- -h, --help
- print this help
- -i, --input=<file>
- name of input file
- -o, --output=<file>
- name of output file
- -d, --outdir=<output directory>
- name of output directory
- -P, --progress
- print progress bar in batch mode
- -S, --syntax=<type>
- set type of source code, necessary if input file suffix is missing
- -v, --verbose
- print debug info to stderr
- -p, --list-langs
- list installed language definitions
- -q, --quiet
- supress progress info in batch mode
- -w, --list-themes
- list installed themes
- --force
- generate output if input syntax is unknown
- --plug-in=<script>
- execute Lua plug-in script; repeat option to apply multiple plug-ins
- --plug-in-read
- set input file for a plug-in (e.g. 'tags')
- --print-config
- print path configuration
- --print-style
- print stylesheet only (see --style-outfile)
- --skip=<list>
- ignore listed unknown file types (Example: --skip='bak;c~;h~')
- --start-nested=<lang>
- define nested language which starts input without opening delimiter
- --validate-input
- test if input is a valid text file
- --version
-
print version and copyright info
Output formatting options
- -O, --out-format=<format>
- output file in given format <format>=[html, xhtml, latex, tex, rtf, odt, ansi, xterm256, bbcode, svg]
- -c, --style-outfile=<file>
- name of style definition file or output to stdout, if "stdout" is given as file argument
- -T, --doc-title
- document title
- -e, --style-infile=<file>
- name of file to be included in style-outfile
- -f, --fragment
- omit header and footer of the output document
- -F, --reformat=<style>
- reformat output in given style. <style>=[allman, banner, gnu, java, kr, linux, stroustrup, whitesmith]
- -I, --include-style
- include style definition in output
- -J, --line-length=<num>
- line length before wrapping (see -W, -V)
- -j, --line-number-length=<num>
- line number length incl. left padding
- -k, --font=<font>
- set font (specific to output format)
- -K, --font-size=<num?>
- set font size (specific to output format)
- -l, --line-numbers
- print line numbers in output file
- -m, --line-number-start=<cnt>
- start line numbering with cnt (assumes -l)
- -s, --style=<style name>
- set highlighting style (see --list-themes)
- -t --replace-tabs=<num>
- replace tabs by num spaces
- -u, --encoding=<enc>
- set output encoding which matches input file encoding; omit encoding information if set to "NONE"
- -V, --wrap-simple
- wrap long lines without indenting function parameters and statements
- -W, --wrap
- wrap long lines (use with caution)
- -z, --zeroes
- fill leading space of line numbers with zeroes
- --kw-case=<upper|lower|capitalize>
- output all keywords in given case if language is not case sensitive
- --delim-cr
- set CR as end-of-line delimiter (MacOS 9)
- --no-trailing-nl
- omit trailing newline
- --wrap-no-numbers
-
omit line numbers of wrapped lines (assumes -l)
(X)HTML OPTIONS
- -a, --anchors
- attach anchors to line numbers (HTML only)
- -y, --anchor-prefix=<str>
- set anchor name prefix
- -N, --anchor-filename
- use input file name as anchor name
- -C, --print-index
- print index file with links to all output files
- -n, --ordered-list
- print lines as ordered list items
- --class-name=<str>
- set CSS class name prefix; omit class name if set to "NONE"
- --inline-css
- output CSS within each tag (verbose output)
- --enclose-pre
-
enclose fragmented output with pre tag (assumes -f)
LaTeX OPTIONS
- -b, --babel
- disable Babel package shorthands
- -r, --replace-quotes
- replace double quotes by \dq
- --pretty-symbols
-
improve appearance of brackets and other symbols
RTF OPTIONS
- -x, --page-size=<size>
- set page size, <size>=[a3, a4, a5, b4, b5, b6, letter]
- --char-styles
-
include character stylesheets
SVG OPTIONS
- --height=<h>
- set image height (units allowed)
- --width=<w>
-
set image size (see --height)
GNU SOURCE-HIGHLIGHT COMPATIBILITY OPTIONS
- --doc
- create stand alone document
- --no-doc
- cancel the --doc option
- --css=filename
- the external style sheet filename
- --src-lang=STRING
- source language
- -t, --tab=INT
- specify tab length
- -n, --line-number[=0]
- number all output lines, optional padding
- --line-number-ref[=p]
-
number all output lines and generate an anchor, made of the specified prefix
p + the line number (default='line') - --output-dir=path
output directory - --failsafe
- if no language definition is found for the input, it is simply copied to the output
If no in- or output files are specified, stdin and stdout will be used for in- or output. HTML will be generated unless an other output format is given. Style definitions are stored in highlight.css (HTML, XHTML, SVG) or highlight.sty (LaTeX, TeX) if neither -c nor -I is given. Reformatting code (-F) will only work with C, C++, C# and Java input files.
BUGS
The wrapping options might cause faulty highlighting of multi line comments.FILES
The parsing information of the programming languages is stored in /usr/share/highlight/langDefs/. You may enhance highlight's parsing capabilities by adding more *.lang - files to this directory. You can also define other directories with --data-dir. Documentation files are stored in /usr/share/doc/highlight/ , configuration files in /etc/highlight/.Examples
Single file conversion:highlight -o hello.html -i hello.c
highlight -o hello.html hello.c
highlight -o hello.html -S c < hello.c
highlight -S c < hello.c > hello.html
Note that a file highlight.css is created in the current directory.
Batch file processing:
highlight --out-format=xhtml -B '*.cpp' -d /home/you/html_code/
converts all *.cpp files in the current directory and its subdirectories to xhtml files, and stores the output in /home/you/html_code.
highlight --out-format=latex * -d /home/you/latex_code/
converts all files to LaTeX, stored in /home/you/latex_code/.
Use --quiet to improve performance of batch file processing (recommended for usage in shell scripts).
Use highlight --out-format=xterm256 <yourfile> | less -R to display a source file in a terminal.