[4mLESS[24m(1)                     General Commands Manual                    [4mLESS[24m(1)

[1mNAME[0m
       less - display the contents of a file in a terminal

[1mSYNOPSIS[0m
       [1mless -?[0m
       [1mless --help[0m
       [1mless -V[0m
       [1mless --version[0m
       [1mless [-[+]aABcCdeEfFgGiIJKLmMnNqQrRsSuUVwWX~][0m
            [1m[-b [4m[22mspace[24m[1m] [-h [4m[22mlines[24m[1m] [-j [4m[22mline[24m[1m] [-k [4m[22mkeyfile[24m[1m][0m
            [1m[-{oO} [4m[22mlogfile[24m[1m] [-p [4m[22mpattern[24m[1m] [-P [4m[22mprompt[24m[1m] [-t [4m[22mtag[24m[1m][0m
            [1m[-T [4m[22mtagsfile[24m[1m] [-x [4m[22mtab[24m[1m,...] [-y [4m[22mlines[24m[1m] [-[z] [4m[22mlines[24m[1m][0m
            [1m[-# [4m[22mshift[24m[1m] [+[+][4m[22mcmd[24m[1m] [--] [[4m[22mfilename[24m[1m]...[0m
       (See  the  OPTIONS section for alternate option syntax with long option
       names.)

[1mDESCRIPTION[0m
       [1mLess [22mis a program similar to [1mmore[22m(1), but it has  many  more  features.
       [1mLess  [22mdoes  not  have to read the entire input file before starting, so
       with large input files it starts  up  faster  than  text  editors  like
       [1mvi[22m(1).   [1mLess [22muses termcap (or terminfo on some systems), so it can run
       on a variety of terminals.  There is even limited support for  hardcopy
       terminals.   (On  a hardcopy terminal, lines which should be printed at
       the top of the screen are prefixed with a caret.)

[1mCOMMANDS[0m
       Commands are based on both [1mmore [22mand [1mvi[22m.  Commands may be preceded by  a
       decimal number, called N in the descriptions below.  The number is used
       by some commands, as indicated.

       In  the following descriptions, ^X means control‐X.  ESC stands for the
       ESCAPE key; for example ESC‐v means the  two  character  sequence  "ES‐
       CAPE", then "v".

       h or H Help:  display  a  summary of these commands.  If you forget all
              the other commands, remember this one.

       SPACE or ^V or f or ^F
              Scroll forward N lines, default one window (see  option  -z  be‐
              low).  If N is more than the screen size, only the final screen‐
              ful  is  displayed.   Warning:  some systems use ^V as a special
              literalization character.

       z      Like SPACE, but if N is specified, it  becomes  the  new  window
              size.

       ENTER or RETURN or ^N or e or ^E or j or ^J
              Scroll  forward N lines, default 1.  The entire N lines are dis‐
              played, even if N is more than the screen size.

       d or ^D
              Scroll forward N lines, default one half of the screen size.  If
              N is specified, it becomes the new default for subsequent d  and
              u commands.

       b or ^B or ESC‐v
              Scroll  backward  N lines, default one window (see option -z be‐
              low).  If N is more than the screen size, only the final screen‐
              ful is displayed.

       w      Like ESC‐v, but if N is specified, it  becomes  the  new  window
              size.

       y or ^Y or ^P or k or ^K
              Scroll backward N lines, default 1.  The entire N lines are dis‐
              played,  even  if N is more than the screen size.  Warning: some
              systems use ^Y as a special job control character.

       u or ^U
              Scroll backward N lines, default one half of  the  screen  size.
              If  N  is specified, it becomes the new default for subsequent d
              and u commands.

       J      Like j, but continues to scroll beyond the end of the file.

       K or Y Like k, but continues to scroll  beyond  the  beginning  of  the
              file.

       ESC‐SPACE
              Like SPACE, but scrolls a full screenful, even if it reaches the
              end of the file.

       ESC‐b  Like b, but scrolls a full screenful, even if it reaches the be‐
              ginning of the file.

       ESC‐j  Scroll  forward  N file lines, default 1.  A file line is a com‐
              plete line in the file, terminated by a newline.

       ESC‐k  Scroll backwards N file lines, default 1.

       ESC‐) or RIGHTARROW
              Scroll horizontally right N characters, default half the  screen
              width  (see  the -# option).  If a number N is specified, it be‐
              comes the default for future RIGHTARROW and LEFTARROW  commands.
              While  the  text  is  scrolled,  it acts as though the -S option
              (chop lines) were in effect.

       ESC‐( or LEFTARROW
              Scroll horizontally left N characters, default half  the  screen
              width  (see  the -# option).  If a number N is specified, it be‐
              comes the default for future RIGHTARROW and LEFTARROW commands.

       ESC‐} or ^RIGHTARROW
              Scroll horizontally right to show the end of  the  longest  dis‐
              played line.

       ESC‐{ or ^LEFTARROW
              Scroll horizontally left back to the first column.

       r or ^R or ^L
              Repaint the screen.

       R      Repaint the screen, discarding any buffered input.  That is, re‐
              load  the current file.  Useful if the file is changing while it
              is being viewed.

       F      Scroll forward, and keep trying to read when the end of file  is
              reached.   Normally  this  command would be used when already at
              the end of the file.  It is a way to monitor the tail of a  file
              which  is  growing  while  it is being viewed.  (The behavior is
              similar to the "tail -f" command.)  To  stop  waiting  for  more
              data,  enter  the  interrupt character (usually ^C).  On systems
              which support [1mpoll[22m(2) you can also use ^X or the character spec‐
              ified by the --intr option.  If the input  is  a  pipe  and  the
              --exit‐follow‐on‐close  option is in effect, [1mless [22mwill automati‐
              cally stop waiting for data when the input side of the  pipe  is
              closed.

       ESC‐F  Like  F,  but  as soon as a line is found which matches the last
              search pattern, the terminal bell is rung and forward  scrolling
              stops.

       g or < or ESC‐<
              Go to line N in the file, default 1 (beginning of file).  (Warn‐
              ing: this may be slow if N is large.)

       G or > or ESC‐>
              Go  to  line N in the file, default the end of the file.  (Warn‐
              ing: this may be slow if N is large, or if N  is  not  specified
              and standard input, rather than a file, is being read.)

       ESC‐G  Same  as  G, except if no number N is specified and the input is
              standard input,  goes  to  the  last  line  which  is  currently
              buffered.

       p or % Go to a position N percent into the file.  N should be between 0
              and 100, and may contain a decimal point.

       P      Go to the line containing byte offset N in the file.

       {      If a left curly bracket appears in the top line displayed on the
              screen,  the  {  command  will  go  to  the matching right curly
              bracket.  The matching right curly bracket is positioned on  the
              bottom line of the screen.  If there is more than one left curly
              bracket  on  the top line, a number N may be used to specify the
              N‐th bracket on the line.

       }      If a right curly bracket appears in the bottom line displayed on
              the screen, the } command will go to  the  matching  left  curly
              bracket.   The  matching left curly bracket is positioned on the
              top line of the screen.  If there is more than one  right  curly
              bracket  on  the  bottom line, a number N may be used to specify
              the N‐th bracket on the line.

       (      Like {, but applies to parentheses rather than curly brackets.

       )      Like }, but applies to parentheses rather than curly brackets.

       [      Like {, but applies to square brackets rather than curly  brack‐
              ets.

       ]      Like  }, but applies to square brackets rather than curly brack‐
              ets.

       ESC‐^F Followed by two characters, acts like {, but uses the two  char‐
              acters  as  open and close brackets, respectively.  For example,
              "ESC ^F < >" could be used to go forward to the > which  matches
              the < in the top displayed line.

       ESC‐^B Followed  by two characters, acts like }, but uses the two char‐
              acters as open and close brackets, respectively.   For  example,
              "ESC ^B < >" could be used to go backward to the < which matches
              the > in the bottom displayed line.

       m      Followed  by  any lowercase or uppercase letter, marks the first
              displayed line with that letter.  If the status  column  is  en‐
              abled  via  the  -J  option,  the status column shows the marked
              line.

       M      Acts like m, except the last displayed  line  is  marked  rather
              than the first displayed line.

       '      (Single  quote.)  Followed by any lowercase or uppercase letter,
              returns to the position which was previously  marked  with  that
              letter.   Followed by another single quote, returns to the posi‐
              tion at which the last "large" movement  command  was  executed.
              Followed  by a ^ or $, jumps to the beginning or end of the file
              respectively.  Marks are preserved when a new file  is  examined
              within a single invocation of [1mless[22m, so the ' command can be used
              to  switch  between input files.  The --save‐marks option causes
              marks to be preserved across different invocations of [1mless[22m.

       ^X^X   Same as single quote.

       ESC‐m  Followed by any lowercase or uppercase letter, clears  the  mark
              identified by that letter.

       /pattern
              Search forward in the file for the N‐th line containing the pat‐
              tern.  N defaults to 1.  The pattern is a regular expression, as
              recognized  by  the  regular expression library supplied by your
              system.  By default, searching is case‐sensitive (uppercase  and
              lowercase  are  considered different); the -i option can be used
              to change this.  The search starts at the first  line  displayed
              (but see the -a and -j options, which change this).

              Certain  characters  are  special if entered at the beginning of
              the pattern; they modify the type of search rather  than  become
              part of the pattern:

              ^N or !
                     Search for lines which do NOT match the pattern.

              ^E or *
                     Search  multiple  files.   That is, if the search reaches
                     the END of the current file without finding a match,  the
                     search  continues  in  the  next file in the command line
                     list.

              ^F or @
                     Begin the search at the first line of the FIRST  file  in
                     the  command  line  list, regardless of what is currently
                     displayed on the screen or the settings of the -a  or  -j
                     options.

              ^K     Highlight  any text which matches the pattern on the cur‐
                     rent screen, but don’t move to the first match (KEEP cur‐
                     rent position).

              ^R     Don’t interpret regular expression  metacharacters;  that
                     is, do a simple textual comparison.

              ^S     Followed  by  a digit N between 1 and 5.  Only text which
                     has a non‐empty match for the N‐th parenthesized SUB‐PAT‐
                     TERN will be considered to match the pattern.  For  exam‐
                     ple,  searching for "(abc)|(def)" modified with ^S1 would
                     search for instances of "abc", but  would  highlight  in‐
                     stances of both "abc" and "def".  (Supported only if [1mless[0m
                     is  built  with  one  of the regular expression libraries
                     [1mposix[22m, [1mpcre[22m, or [1mpcre2[22m.)  Multiple  ^S  modifiers  can  be
                     specified, to match more than one sub‐pattern.

              ^W     WRAP  around  the  current  file.  That is, if the search
                     reaches the end of the current  file  without  finding  a
                     match,  the  search  continues from the first line of the
                     current file up to the line where it started.  If the  ^W
                     modifier is set, the ^E modifier is ignored.

              ^L     The  next  character  is taken literally; that is, it be‐
                     comes part of the pattern even if it is one of the  above
                     search modifier characters.

       ?pattern
              Search  backward  in  the  file for the N‐th line containing the
              pattern.  The search starts at the last line displayed (but  see
              the -a and -j options, which change this).

              Certain characters are special as in the / command:

              ^N or !
                     Search for lines which do NOT match the pattern.

              ^E or *
                     Search  multiple  files.   That is, if the search reaches
                     the beginning of  the  current  file  without  finding  a
                     match,  the  search continues in the previous file in the
                     command line list.

              ^F or @
                     Begin the search at the last line of the last file in the
                     command line list, regardless of what is  currently  dis‐
                     played  on the screen or the settings of the -a or -j op‐
                     tions.

              ^K     As in forward searches.

              ^R     As in forward searches.

              ^S     As in forward searches.

              ^W     WRAP around the current file.  That  is,  if  the  search
                     reaches the beginning of the current file without finding
                     a  match,  the search continues from the last line of the
                     current file up to the line where it started.

              ^L     As in forward searches.

       ESC‐/pattern
              Same as "/*".

       ESC‐?pattern
              Same as "?*".

       n      Repeat previous search, for N‐th line containing the  last  pat‐
              tern.   If the previous search was modified by ^N, the search is
              made for the N‐th line NOT containing the pattern.  If the  pre‐
              vious  search  was  modified  by ^E, the search continues in the
              next (or previous) file if not satisfied in  the  current  file.
              If  the  previous  search was modified by ^R, the search is done
              without using regular expressions.  If the previous  search  was
              modified  by  ^W,  the search wraps at the end (or beginning) of
              the file.  There is no effect if the previous search  was  modi‐
              fied by ^F or ^K.

       N      Repeat previous search, but in the reverse direction.

       ESC‐n  Repeat  previous  search, but crossing file boundaries.  The ef‐
              fect is as if the previous search were modified by *.

       ESC‐N  Repeat previous search, but in the reverse direction and  cross‐
              ing file boundaries.

       ESC‐u  Undo  search  highlighting.   Turn  off  highlighting of strings
              matching the current search pattern.  If highlighting is already
              off because of a previous ESC‐u command, turn highlighting  back
              on.   Any  search  command  will also turn highlighting back on.
              (Highlighting can also be disabled by toggling the -G option; in
              that case search commands do not turn highlighting back on.)

       ESC‐U  Like ESC‐u but also clears the saved  search  pattern.   If  the
              status  column  is  enabled  via  the -J option, this clears all
              search matches marked in the status column.

       &pattern
              Display only lines which match the pattern; lines which  do  not
              match  the  pattern  are not displayed.  If pattern is empty (if
              you type & immediately followed  by  ENTER),  any  filtering  is
              turned  off, and all lines are displayed.  While filtering is in
              effect, an ampersand  is  displayed  at  the  beginning  of  the
              prompt, as a reminder that some lines in the file may be hidden.
              Multiple  &  commands  may  be entered, in which case only lines
              which match all of the patterns will be displayed.

              Certain characters are special as in the / command:

              ^N or !
                     Display only lines which do NOT match the pattern.

              ^R     Don’t interpret regular expression  metacharacters;  that
                     is, do a simple textual comparison.

       :e [filename]
              Examine  a  new file.  If the filename is missing, the "current"
              file (see the :n and :p commands below) from the list  of  files
              in  the  command line is re‐examined.  A percent sign (%) in the
              filename is replaced by the name of the current file.   A  pound
              sign  (#)  is  replaced  by  the name of the previously examined
              file.  However, two consecutive percent  signs  are  simply  re‐
              placed  with  a single percent sign.  This allows you to enter a
              filename that contains a percent sign in the  name.   Similarly,
              two  consecutive  pound  signs  are replaced with a single pound
              sign.  The filename is inserted into the command  line  list  of
              files  so  that it can be seen by subsequent :n and :p commands.
              If the filename consists of several files, they are all inserted
              into the list of files and the first one is  examined.   If  the
              filename contains one or more spaces, the entire filename should
              be enclosed in double quotes (also see the -" option).

       ^X^V or E
              Same  as :e.  Warning: some systems use ^V as a special literal‐
              ization character.  On such systems, you may not be able to  use
              ^V.

       :n     Examine  the next file (from the list of files given in the com‐
              mand line).  If a number N is specified, the N‐th next  file  is
              examined.

       :p     Examine the previous file in the command line list.  If a number
              N is specified, the N‐th previous file is examined.

       :x     Examine  the first file in the command line list.  If a number N
              is specified, the N‐th file in the list is examined.

       :d     Remove the current file from the list of files.

       t      Go to the next tag, if there were more than one matches for  the
              current tag.  See the -t option for more details about tags.

       T      Go  to the previous tag, if there were more than one matches for
              the current tag.

       ^O^N or ^On
              Search forward in the file for the N‐th next OSC 8 hyperlink.

       ^O^P or ^Op
              Search backward in the file for the N‐th previous OSC  8  hyper‐
              link.

       ^O^L or ^Ol
              Jump to the currently selected OSC 8 hyperlink.

       = or ^G or :f
              Prints  some  information about the file being viewed, including
              its name and the line number and byte offset of the bottom  line
              being  displayed.  If possible, it also prints the length of the
              file, the number of lines in the file and  the  percent  of  the
              file above the last displayed line.

       -      Followed  by one of the command line option letters (see OPTIONS
              below), this will change the setting of that option and print  a
              message  describing the new setting.  If a ^P (CONTROL‐P) is en‐
              tered immediately after the dash, the setting of the  option  is
              changed  but  no message is printed.  If the option letter has a
              numeric value (such as -b or -h), or a string value (such as  -P
              or  -t), a new value may be entered after the option letter.  If
              no new value is entered, a message describing the  current  set‐
              ting is printed and nothing is changed.

       --     Like  the  -  command, but takes a long option name (see OPTIONS
              below) rather than a single option letter.  Press ENTER  or  RE‐
              TURN  after  typing the option name to change it.  You can enter
              just the beginning of an option name, then press TAB to find all
              option names which begin with that string.  A ^P immediately af‐
              ter the second dash suppresses printing of a message  describing
              the new setting, as in the - command.

       -+     Followed by one of the command line option letters this will re‐
              set  the  option  to its default setting and print a message de‐
              scribing the new setting.  (The  "-+[4mX[24m"  command  does  the  same
              thing  as  "-+[4mX[24m"  on  the command line.)  This does not work for
              string‐valued options.

       --+    Like the -+ command, but takes a long option name rather than  a
              single option letter.

       -!     Followed  by  one  of the command line option letters, this will
              reset the option to the "opposite" of its  default  setting  and
              print  a message describing the new setting.  This does not work
              for numeric or string‐valued options.

       --!    Like the -! command, but takes a long option name rather than  a
              single option letter.

       _      (Underscore.)   Followed  by one of the command line option let‐
              ters, this will print a message describing the  current  setting
              of that option.  The setting of the option is not changed.

       __     (Double underscore.)  Like the _ (underscore) command, but takes
              a long option name rather than a single option letter.  You must
              press ENTER or RETURN after typing the option name.

       +cmd   Causes  the specified cmd to be executed each time a new file is
              examined.  For example, +G causes [1mless [22mto initially display each
              file starting at the end rather than the beginning.

       V      Prints the version number of [1mless [22mbeing run.

       q or Q or :q or :Q or ZZ
              Exits [1mless[22m.

       The following seven commands may or may not be valid, depending on your
       particular installation.

       v      Invokes an editor to edit the current file  being  viewed.   The
              editor is taken from the environment variable VISUAL if defined,
              or  EDITOR if VISUAL is not defined, or defaults to "vi" if nei‐
              ther VISUAL nor EDITOR is defined.  See also the  discussion  of
              LESSEDIT under the section on PROMPTS below.

       ! shell‐command
              Invokes  a shell to run the shell‐command given.  A percent sign
              (%) in the command is replaced by the name of the current  file.
              A pound sign (#) is replaced by the name of the previously exam‐
              ined  file.   "!!"  repeats the last shell command.  "!" with no
              shell command invokes an interactive shell.  If a ^P (CONTROL‐P)
              is entered immediately after the !, no "done" message is printed
              after the shell command is executed.  On Unix systems, the shell
              is taken from the environment variable  SHELL,  or  defaults  to
              "sh".   On  MS‐DOS,  Windows, and OS/2 systems, the shell is the
              normal command processor.

       # shell‐command
              Similar to the "!" command, except that the command is  expanded
              in the same way as prompt strings.  For example, the name of the
              current file would be given as "%f".

       | <m> shell‐command
              <m>  represents  any  mark letter.  Pipes a section of the input
              file to the given shell command.  The section of the file to  be
              piped  is between the position marked by the letter and the cur‐
              rent screen.  The entire current screen is included,  regardless
              of  whether  the  marked position is before or after the current
              screen.  <m> may also be ^ or $ to indicate beginning or end  of
              file  respectively.   If <m> is . or newline, the current screen
              is piped.  If a ^P (CONTROL‐P) is entered immediately after  the
              mark  letter,  no "done" message is printed after the shell com‐
              mand is executed.

       s filename
              Save the input to a file.  This works only if  the  input  is  a
              pipe, not an ordinary file.

       ^O^O
              Run  a shell command to open the URI in the current OSC 8 hyper‐
              link, selected by a previous ^O^N or ^O^P command.  To find  the
              shell command, the environment variable named "LESS_OSC8_xxx" is
              read,  where  "xxx"  is the scheme from the URI (the part before
              the first colon), or is empty if there is no colon in  the  URI.
              The  value  of  the environment variable is then expanded in the
              same way as prompt strings (in particular, any instance of  "%o"
              is  replaced  with  the URI) to produce an OSC 8 "handler" shell
              command.  The standard output from the handler  is  an  "opener"
              shell command which is then executed to open the URI.

              There are two special cases:

                     1.     If  the  URI begins with "#", the remainder of the
                            URI is taken to be the value of the  id  parameter
                            in  another  OSC 8 link in the same file, and ^O^O
                            will simply jump to that link.

                     2.     If the opener begins with the characters ":e" fol‐
                            lowed by whitespace and a filename,  then  instead
                            of  running  the  opener  as  a shell command, the
                            specified filename is opened in  the  current  in‐
                            stance of [1mless[22m.

              In  a simple case where the opener accepts the complete URI as a
              command line parameter, the handler may be as simple as

              echo mybrowser ’%o’

              In other cases, the URI may need to be modified, so the  handler
              may have to do some manipulation of the %o value.

              If   the   LESS_OSC8_xxx  variable  is  not  set,  the  variable
              LESS_OSC8_ANY  is   tried.    If   neither   LESS_OSC8_xxx   nor
              LESS_OSC8_ANY  is  set,  links  using the "xxx" scheme cannot be
              opened.  However, there are default  handlers  for  the  schemes
              "man" (used when LESS_OSC8_man is not set) and "file" (used when
              LESS_OSC8_file  is  not set), which should work on systems which
              provide the [1msed[22m(1) command and a shell  with  syntax  compatible
              with  the Bourne shell [1msh[22m(1).  If you use LESS_OSC8_ANY to over‐
              ride LESS_OSC8_file, you must set LESS_OSC8_file to "‐" to indi‐
              cate that the default value should not be used, and likewise for
              LESS_OSC8_man.

              The URI passed to an OSC8 handler via %o is  guaranteed  not  to
              contain  any single quote or double quote characters, but it may
              contain any other shell metacharacters such as semicolons,  dol‐
              lar signs, ampersands, etc.  The handler should take care to ap‐
              propriately  quote  parameters in the opener command, to prevent
              execution of unintended shell commands in the case of opening  a
              URI  which  contains shell metacharacters.  Also, since the han‐
              dler command is expanded like a command prompt, any  metacharac‐
              ters  interpreted  by  prompt  expansion  (such as percent, dot,
              colon, backslash, etc.) must be escaped with  a  backslash  (see
              the PROMPTS section for details).

       ^X     When  the "Waiting for data" message is displayed, such as while
              in the F command, pressing ^X will stop [1mless  [22mfrom  waiting  and
              return  to a prompt.  This may cause [1mless [22mto think that the file
              ends at the current position, so it may be necessary to use  the
              R  or F command to see more data.  The --intr option can be used
              to specify a different character to use  instead  of  ^X.   This
              command works only on systems that support the [1mpoll[22m(2) function.
              On systems without [1mpoll[22m(2), the interrupt character (usually ^C)
              can be used instead.

[1mOPTIONS[0m
       Command  line options are described below.  Most options may be changed
       while [1mless [22mis running, via the "-" command.

       Some options may be given in one of two forms: either a  dash  followed
       by  a  single  letter, or two dashes followed by a long option name.  A
       long option name may be abbreviated as long as the abbreviation is  un‐
       ambiguous.   For  example,  --mouse  may  be abbreviated --mou, but not
       --mo, since both --mouse and --modelines begin with  --mo.   Some  long
       option  names are in uppercase, such as --QUIT‐AT‐EOF, as distinct from
       --quit‐at‐eof.  Such option names need only  have  their  first  letter
       capitalized;  the remainder of the name may be in either case.  For ex‐
       ample, --Quit‐at‐eof is equivalent to --QUIT‐AT‐EOF.

       Options are also taken from the environment variable "LESS".  For exam‐
       ple, to avoid typing "less -options ..." each time [1mless [22mis invoked, you
       might tell [1mcsh[22m:

       setenv LESS "-options"

       or if you use [1msh[22m:

       LESS="-options"; export LESS

       On MS‐DOS and Windows, you don’t need the quotes,  but  you  should  be
       careful  that  any  percent  signs in the options string are not inter‐
       preted as an environment variable expansion.

       The environment variable is parsed before the command line, so  command
       line  options override the LESS environment variable.  If an option ap‐
       pears in the LESS variable, it can be reset to its default value on the
       command line by beginning the command line option with "-+".

       Some options like -k or -D require a string to follow the  option  let‐
       ter.   The  string  for  that option is considered to end when a dollar
       sign ($) is found.  For example, you can set two -D options like this:

       LESS="Dnwb$Dsbw"

       If the --use‐backslash option appears earlier in the  options,  then  a
       dollar  sign or backslash may be included literally in an option string
       by preceding it with a backslash.  If the --use‐backslash option is not
       in effect, then backslashes are not treated specially, and there is  no
       way to include a dollar sign in the option string.

       -? or --help
              This  option displays a summary of the commands accepted by [1mless[0m
              (the same as the h command).  (Depending on how your  shell  in‐
              terprets  the  question  mark,  it may be necessary to quote the
              question mark, thus: "-\?".)

       -a or --search‐skip‐screen
              By default, forward searches start at the top of  the  displayed
              screen  and  backwards  searches start at the bottom of the dis‐
              played screen (except for repeated searches invoked by the n  or
              N  commands,  which  start after or before the "target" line re‐
              spectively; see the -j option for more about the  target  line).
              The  -a  option  causes forward searches to instead start at the
              bottom of the screen and backward searches to start at  the  top
              of the screen, thus skipping all lines displayed on the screen.

       -A or --SEARCH‐SKIP‐SCREEN
              Causes  all forward searches (not just non‐repeated searches) to
              start just after the target line, and all backward  searches  to
              start  just before the target line.  Thus, forward searches will
              skip part of the displayed screen (from the first line up to and
              including the target line).  Similarly backwards  searches  will
              skip the displayed screen from the last line up to and including
              the target line.  This was the default behavior in less versions
              prior to 441.

       -b[4mn[24m or --buffers=[4mn[0m
              Specifies  the  amount  of  buffer  space [1mless [22mwill use for each
              file, in units of kilobytes (1024 bytes).  By default  64 KB  of
              buffer  space  is used for each file (unless the file is a pipe;
              see the -B option).  The -b  option  specifies  instead  that  [4mn[0m
              kilobytes of buffer space should be used for each file.  If [4mn[24m is
              -1,  buffer  space is unlimited; that is, the entire file can be
              read into memory.

       -B or --auto‐buffers
              By default, when data is read from a pipe, buffers are allocated
              automatically as needed.  If a large amount of data is read from
              the pipe, this can cause a large amount of memory  to  be  allo‐
              cated.   The  -B  option  disables  this automatic allocation of
              buffers for pipes, so that only 64 KB (or the  amount  of  space
              specified  by the -b option) is used for the pipe.  Warning: use
              of -B can result in erroneous display, since only the  most  re‐
              cently viewed part of the piped data is kept in memory; any ear‐
              lier  data  is  lost.  Lost characters are displayed as question
              marks.

       -c or --clear‐screen
              Causes full screen repaints to be  painted  from  the  top  line
              down.   By  default,  full screen repaints are done by scrolling
              from the bottom of the screen.

       -C or --CLEAR‐SCREEN
              Same as -c, for compatibility with older versions of [1mless[22m.

       -d or --dumb
              The -d option suppresses the error message normally displayed if
              the terminal is dumb; that is, lacks some important  capability,
              such as the ability to clear the screen or scroll backward.  The
              -d  option  does  not otherwise change the behavior of [1mless [22mon a
              dumb terminal.

       -D[1mx[4m[22mcolor[24m or --color=[1mx[4m[22mcolor[0m
              Changes the color of different parts of the displayed  text.   [1mx[0m
              is a single character which selects the type of text whose color
              is being set:

              B      Binary characters.

              C      Control characters.

              E      Errors and informational messages.

              H      Header lines and columns, set via the --header option.

              M      Mark letters in the status column.

              N      Line numbers enabled via the -N option.

              P      Prompts.

              R      The rscroll character.

              S      Search results.

              W      The highlight enabled via the -w option.

              1‐5    The  text  in  a  search  result  which matches the first
                     through  fifth  parenthesized  sub‐pattern.   Sub‐pattern
                     coloring works only if [1mless [22mis built with one of the reg‐
                     ular expression libraries [1mposix[22m, [1mpcre[22m, or [1mpcre2[22m.

              d      Bold text.

              k      Blinking text.

              s      Standout text.

              u      Underlined text.

              The  uppercase  letters  and  digits  can  be used only when the
              --use‐color option is enabled.  When text color is specified  by
              both  an  uppercase letter and a lowercase letter, the uppercase
              letter takes precedence.  For example, error messages  are  nor‐
              mally  displayed  as  standout text.  So if both "s" and "E" are
              given a color, the "E" color applies to error messages, and  the
              "s" color applies to other standout text.  The lowercase letters
              refer  to  bold  and  underline text formed by overstriking with
              backspaces (see the -U option) and to non‐content text (such  as
              line  numbers and prompts), but not to text formatted using ANSI
              escape sequences with the -R option (but see the note below  for
              different behavior on Windows and MS‐DOS).

              A  lowercase  letter may be followed by a + to indicate that the
              normal format change and the  specified  color  should  both  be
              used.  For example, -Dug displays underlined text as green with‐
              out  underlining;  the green color has replaced the usual under‐
              line formatting.  But -Du+g displays  underlined  text  as  both
              green and in underlined format.

              [4mcolor[24m is either a 4‐bit color string or an 8‐bit color string:

              A  4‐bit  color string is one or two characters, where the first
              character specifies the foreground color and the  second  speci‐
              fies the background color as follows:

              b      Blue

              c      Cyan

              g      Green

              k      Black

              m      Magenta

              r      Red

              w      White

              y      Yellow

              The  corresponding  uppercase letter denotes a brighter shade of
              the color.  For example, -DNGk displays line numbers  as  bright
              green  text on a black background, and -DEbR displays error mes‐
              sages as blue text on a bright red background.  If either  char‐
              acter  is a "‐" or is omitted, the corresponding color is set to
              that of normal text.

              An 8‐bit color string is one or two decimal  integers  separated
              by a dot, where the first integer specifies the foreground color
              and  the second specifies the background color.  Each integer is
              a value between 0 and 255 inclusive which selects a  "CSI  38;5"
              color                         value                         (see
              https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ANSI_escape_code#SGR).  If  either
              integer  is  a "‐" or is omitted, the corresponding color is set
              to that of normal text.

              A 4‐bit or 8‐bit color string may be followed by one or more  of
              the  following  characters to set text attributes in addition to
              the color.

              s or ˜ Standout (reverse video)

              u or _ Underline

              d or * Bold

              l or & Blinking

              On MS‐DOS and Windows, the --color  option  behaves  differently
              from what is described above in these ways:

              •      The bold (d and *) and blinking (l and &) text attributes
                     at the end of a color string are not supported.

              •      Lowercase  color selector letters refer to text formatted
                     by ANSI escape sequences with -R, in  addition  to  over‐
                     struck and non‐content text (but see -Da).

              •      For  historical  reasons, when a lowercase color selector
                     letter is followed by a numeric color value,  the  number
                     is  not  interpreted  as an "CSI 38;5" color value as de‐
                     scribed    above,    but    instead    as     a     4‐bit
                     CHAR_INFO.Attributes  value,  between  0 and 15 inclusive
                     (see                      https://learn.microsoft.com/en‐
                     us/windows/console/char‐info‐str).

                     To avoid confusion, it is recommended that the equivalent
                     letters  rather  than  numbers  be used after a lowercase
                     color selector on MS‐DOS/Windows.

              •      Numeric color values ("CSI 38;5" color) following an  up‐
                     percase  color  selector letter are not supported on sys‐
                     tems earlier than Windows 10.

              •      Only a limited set of ANSI escape sequences to set  color
                     in  the  content  work  correctly.  4‐bit color sequences
                     work, but "CSI 38;5" color sequences do not.

              •      The -Da option makes the behavior of --color more similar
                     to its behavior on non‐MS‐DOS/Windows systems by (1) mak‐
                     ing lowercase color selector letters not affect text for‐
                     matted with ANSI escape sequences, and (2) allowing  "CSI
                     38;5" color sequences in the content work by passing them
                     to the terminal (only on Windows 10 and later; on earlier
                     Windows systems, such sequences do not work regardless of
                     the setting of -Da).

       -e or --quit‐at‐eof
              Causes  [1mless  [22mto  automatically  exit the second time it reaches
              end‐of‐file.  By default, the only way to exit [1mless [22mis  via  the
              "q" command.

       -E or --QUIT‐AT‐EOF
              Causes [1mless [22mto automatically exit the first time it reaches end‐
              of‐file.

       -f or --force
              Forces non‐regular files to be opened.  (A non‐regular file is a
              directory  or a device special file.)  Also suppresses the warn‐
              ing message when a binary file is opened.  By default, [1mless [22mwill
              refuse to open non‐regular files.  Note that some operating sys‐
              tems will not allow directories to be read, even if -f is set.

       -F or --quit‐if‐one‐screen
              Causes [1mless [22mto automatically exit if the entire file can be dis‐
              played on the first screen.  Also see  the  description  of  the
              LESS_SHELL_LINES environment variable below.

       -g or --hilite‐search
              Normally,  [1mless  [22mwill highlight ALL strings which match the last
              search command.  The -g option changes this  behavior  to  high‐
              light  only  the  particular  string which was found by the last
              search command.  This can cause [1mless [22mto run somewhat faster than
              the default.

       -G or --HILITE‐SEARCH
              The -G option suppresses all highlighting of  strings  found  by
              search commands.

       -h[4mn[24m or --max‐back‐scroll=[4mn[0m
              Specifies  a  maximum number of lines to scroll backward.  If it
              is necessary to scroll backward more than [4mn[24m lines, the screen is
              repainted in a forward direction instead.  (If the terminal does
              not have the ability to scroll backward, -h0 is implied.)

       -i or --ignore‐case
              Causes searches to ignore case; that is, uppercase and lowercase
              are considered identical.  This option is ignored if any  upper‐
              case  letters appear in the search pattern; in other words, if a
              pattern contains uppercase letters, then that  search  does  not
              ignore case.

       -I or --IGNORE‐CASE
              Like  -i,  but searches ignore case even if the pattern contains
              uppercase letters.

       -j[4mn[24m or --jump‐target=[4mn[0m
              Specifies a line on the screen where the "target" line is to  be
              positioned.   The  target line is the line specified by any com‐
              mand to search for a pattern, jump to a line number, jump  to  a
              file percentage or jump to a tag.  The screen line may be speci‐
              fied  by  a number: the top line on the screen is 1, the next is
              2, and so on.  The number may be negative to specify a line rel‐
              ative to the bottom of the screen: the bottom line on the screen
              is -1, the second to the bottom is -2, and so on.   Alternately,
              the  screen line may be specified as a fraction of the height of
              the screen, starting with a decimal point: .5 is in  the  middle
              of  the screen, .3 is three tenths down from the first line, and
              so on.  If the line is specified as a fraction, the actual  line
              number  is  recalculated  if the terminal window is resized.  If
              the --header option is used and the target line specified by  -j
              would be obscured by the header, the target line is moved to the
              first line after the header.

              If  any form of the -j option is used, repeated forward searches
              (invoked with "n" or "N") begin at the  line  immediately  after
              the  target  line,  and  repeated backward searches begin at the
              target line, unless changed by -a or -A.  For example, if  "-j4"
              is  used,  the  target line is the fourth line on the screen, so
              forward searches begin at the fifth line on the screen.  However
              nonrepeated searches (invoked with "/" or "?")  always begin  at
              the start or end of the current screen respectively.

       -J or --status‐column
              Displays  a  status  column at the left edge of the screen.  The
              character displayed in the status column may be one of:

              >      The line is chopped with the -S option, and the text that
                     is chopped off beyond the right edge of the  screen  con‐
                     tains a match for the current search.

              <      The  line  is  horizontally shifted, and the text that is
                     shifted beyond the left side of  the  screen  contains  a
                     match for the current search.

              =      The  line  is  both  chopped  and  shifted, and there are
                     matches beyond both sides of the screen.

              *      There are matches in the visible part  of  the  line  but
                     none to the right or left of it.

              a‐z, A‐Z
                     The  line  has  been marked with the corresponding letter
                     via the m or M command.

       -k[4mfilename[24m or --lesskey‐file=[4mfilename[0m
              Causes [1mless [22mto open and interpret the named file as a [1mlesskey[22m(1)
              binary file.  Multiple -k options  may  be  specified.   If  the
              LESSKEY  or  LESSKEY_SYSTEM environment variable is set, or if a
              lesskey file is found in a standard place (see KEY BINDINGS), it
              is also  used  as  a  [1mlesskey  [22mfile.   Note  the  warning  under
              "--lesskey‐content" below.

       --lesskey‐src=[4mfilename[0m
              Causes [1mless [22mto open and interpret the named file as a [1mlesskey[22m(1)
              source  file.   If the LESSKEYIN or LESSKEYIN_SYSTEM environment
              variable is set, or if a lesskey source file is found in a stan‐
              dard place (see KEY BINDINGS), it is  also  used  as  a  lesskey
              source  file.   Prior to version 582, the [1mlesskey [22mprogram needed
              to be run to convert a lesskey [4msource[24m file to a  lesskey  [4mbinary[0m
              file  for  [1mless [22mto use.  Newer versions of [1mless [22mread the lesskey
              source file directly and ignore the binary file  if  the  source
              file exists.  Note the warning under "--lesskey‐content" below.

       --lesskey‐content=[4mtext[0m
              Causes [1mless [22mto interpret the specified text as the contents of a
              [1mlesskey[22m(1) source file.  In the text, [1mlesskey [22mlines may be sepa‐
              rated  by either newlines as usual, or by semicolons.  A literal
              semicolon may be represented by a backslash followed by a  semi‐
              colon.

              Warning: certain environment variables such as LESS, LESSSECURE,
              LESSCHARSET  and others, which are used early in startup, cannot
              be set in a file specified by a command line option  (--lesskey,
              --lesskey‐src  or --lesskey‐content).  When using a [1mlesskey [22mfile
              to set environment variables, it is safer  to  use  the  default
              lesskey  file,  or  to  specify  the file using the LESSKEYIN or
              LESSKEY_CONTENT environment variables rather than using  a  com‐
              mand line option.

       -K or --quit‐on‐intr
              Causes  [1mless  [22mto exit immediately (with status 2) when an inter‐
              rupt character (usually ^C) is typed.   Normally,  an  interrupt
              character causes [1mless [22mto stop whatever it is doing and return to
              its  command  prompt.  Note that use of this option makes it im‐
              possible to return to the command prompt from the "F" command.

       -L or --no‐lessopen
              Ignore the LESSOPEN environment variable  (see  the  INPUT  PRE‐
              PROCESSOR  section  below).   This option can be set from within
              [1mless[22m, but it will apply only to files opened  subsequently,  not
              to the file which is currently open.

       -m or --long‐prompt
              Causes [1mless [22mto prompt verbosely (like [1mmore[22m(1)), with the percent
              into the file.  By default, [1mless [22mprompts with a colon.

       -M or --LONG‐PROMPT
              Causes [1mless [22mto prompt even more verbosely than [1mmore[22m(1).

       -n or --line‐numbers
              Suppresses  line numbers.  The default (to use line numbers) may
              cause [1mless [22mto run more slowly in some cases, especially  with  a
              very  large input file.  Using line numbers means: the line num‐
              ber will be displayed in the verbose prompt and in  the  =  com‐
              mand, and the v command will pass the current line number to the
              editor (see also the discussion of LESSEDIT in PROMPTS below).

       -N or --LINE‐NUMBERS
              Causes  a  line  number to be displayed at the beginning of each
              line in the display.

       -o[4mfilename[24m or --log‐file=[4mfilename[0m
              Causes [1mless [22mto copy its input to the named file as it  is  being
              viewed.  This applies only when the input file is a pipe, not an
              ordinary  file.   If  the file already exists, [1mless [22mwill ask for
              confirmation before overwriting it.

       -O[4mfilename[24m or --LOG‐FILE=[4mfilename[0m
              The -O option is like -o, but it will overwrite an existing file
              without asking for confirmation.

              If no log file has been specified, the -o and -O options can  be
              used  from  within  [1mless  [22mto specify a log file.  Without a file
              name, they will simply report the name of the log file.  The "s"
              command is equivalent to specifying -o from within [1mless[22m.

       -p[4mpattern[24m or --pattern=[4mpattern[0m
              The -p option on the command line is  equivalent  to  specifying
              +/[4mpattern[24m;  that  is, it tells [1mless [22mto start at the first occur‐
              rence of [4mpattern[24m in the file.

       -P[4mprompt[24m or --prompt=[4mprompt[0m
              Provides a way to tailor the three prompt  styles  to  your  own
              preference.  This option would normally be put in the LESS envi‐
              ronment variable, rather than being typed in with each [1mless [22mcom‐
              mand.  Such an option must either be the last option in the LESS
              variable, or be terminated by a dollar sign.
               -Ps  followed by a string changes the default (short) prompt to
              that string.
               -Pm changes the medium (-m) prompt.
               -PM changes the long (-M) prompt.
               -Ph changes the prompt for the help screen.
               -P= changes the message printed by the = command.
               -Pw changes the message printed while waiting for data (in  the
              "F" command).

              All  prompt strings consist of a sequence of letters and special
              escape sequences.  See the section on PROMPTS for more details.

       -q or --quiet or --silent
              Causes moderately "quiet" operation: the terminal  bell  is  not
              rung if an attempt is made to scroll past the end of the file or
              before the beginning of the file.  If the terminal has a "visual
              bell",  it  is  used  instead.  The bell will be rung on certain
              other errors, such as typing an invalid character.  The  default
              is to ring the terminal bell in all such cases.

       -Q or --QUIET or --SILENT
              Causes  totally  "quiet"  operation:  the terminal bell is never
              rung.  If the terminal has a "visual bell", it is  used  in  all
              cases where the terminal bell would have been rung.

       -r or --raw‐control‐chars
              Causes "raw" control characters to be displayed.  The default is
              to  display control characters using the caret notation; for ex‐
              ample, a control‐A (octal 001) is displayed as "^A"  (with  some
              exceptions as described under the -U option).  Warning: when the
              -r  option is used, [1mless [22mcannot keep track of the actual appear‐
              ance of the screen (since this depends on  how  the  screen  re‐
              sponds  to  each type of control character).  Thus, various dis‐
              play problems may result, such as long lines being split in  the
              wrong place.

              USE OF THE -r OPTION IS DANGEROUS AND IS NOT RECOMMENDED.
              The  -r  option can be set on the command line or via the - com‐
              mand, but to avoid unintentional use, it cannot be set in a LESS
              environment variable.  If -r appears in a LESS environment vari‐
              able, it is treated as if it were -R.

       -R or --RAW‐CONTROL‐CHARS
              Like -r, but only a limited set of escape sequences  are  output
              in  "raw"  form.  Unlike -r, the screen appearance is maintained
              correctly.  The sequences which are output raw are:

              1. ANSI SGR ("color") sequences

              2. OSC 8 hyperlinks

              3. Other OSC sequences, if the OSC type number is listed in  the
              LESSANSIOSCALLOW environment variable

              4. OSC sequences starting with a non‐standard introductory char‐
              acter  (that  is, something other than "]"), if the character is
              listed in the LESSANSIOSCCHARS environment variable followed  by
              an asterisk

              ANSI color escape sequences are sequences of the form:

                   ESC [ ... m

              where  the "..." is zero or more color specification characters.
              Color escape sequences are only  supported  when  the  color  is
              changed  within one line, not across lines.  In other words, the
              beginning of each line is assumed to  be  normal  (non‐colored),
              regardless of any escape sequences in previous lines.

              You  can  make [1mless [22mthink that characters other than "m" can end
              ANSI color escape sequences by setting the environment  variable
              LESSANSIENDCHARS to the list of characters which can end a color
              escape  sequence.   And  you can make [1mless [22mthink that characters
              other than the standard ones may appear between the ESC and  the
              m  by  setting  the environment variable LESSANSIMIDCHARS to the
              list of characters which can appear.

              OSC sequences are of the form:

                   ESC ] N ; ... \7

              where the OSC type number N is a decimal integer.  The terminat‐
              ing sequence may be either a BEL character (\7) as above, or the
              two‐character sequence "ESC \".

       -s or --squeeze‐blank‐lines
              Causes consecutive blank lines to  be  squeezed  into  a  single
              blank line.  This is useful when viewing [1mnroff[22m(1) output.

       -S or --chop‐long‐lines
              Causes  lines  longer than the screen width to be chopped (trun‐
              cated) rather than wrapped.  That is, the portion of a long line
              that does not fit in the screen width is not displayed until you
              press RIGHT‐ARROW.  The default is to wrap long lines; that  is,
              display the remainder on the next line.  See also the --wordwrap
              option.   While  the --header option is active, the -S option is
              ignored, and lines longer than the screen width are truncated.

       -t[4mtag[24m or --tag=[4mtag[0m
              The -t option, followed immediately by a TAG, will edit the file
              containing that tag.  For this to work, tag information must  be
              available;  for  example, there may be a file in the current di‐
              rectory called "tags", which was previously built by [1mctags[22m(1) or
              an equivalent command.  If the environment variable LESSGLOBALT‐
              AGS is set, it is taken to be the name of a  command  compatible
              with  [1mglobal[22m(1),  and  that command is executed to find the tag.
              (See  http://www.gnu.org/software/global/global.html).   The  -t
              option  may also be specified from within [1mless [22m(using the - com‐
              mand) as a way of examining a new file.   The  command  ":t"  is
              equivalent to specifying -t from within [1mless[22m.

       -T[4mtagsfile[24m or --tag‐file=[4mtagsfile[0m
              Specifies a tags file to be used instead of "tags".

       -u or --underline‐special
              Causes  backspaces  and carriage returns to be treated as print‐
              able characters; that is, they are sent  to  the  terminal  when
              they appear in the input.

       -U or --UNDERLINE‐SPECIAL
              Causes  backspaces, tabs, carriage returns and "formatting char‐
              acters" (as defined by Unicode) to be treated as control charac‐
              ters; that is, they are handled as specified by the -r option.

              By default, if neither -u nor -U is given, backspaces which  ap‐
              pear  adjacent to an underscore character are treated specially:
              the underlined text is displayed using the  terminal’s  hardware
              underlining  capability.   Also, backspaces which appear between
              two identical characters are treated specially:  the  overstruck
              text is printed using the terminal’s hardware boldface capabili‐
              ty.   Other  backspaces  are  deleted,  along with the preceding
              character.  Carriage returns immediately followed by  a  newline
              are deleted.  Other carriage returns are handled as specified by
              the  -r option.  Unicode formatting characters, such as the Byte
              Order Mark, are sent to the terminal.  Text which is  overstruck
              or underlined can be searched for if neither -u nor -U is in ef‐
              fect.

              See also the --proc‐backspace, --proc‐tab, and --proc‐return op‐
              tions.

       -V or --version
              Displays the version number of [1mless[22m.

       -w or --hilite‐unread
              Temporarily  highlights  the  first  "new"  line after a forward
              movement of a full page.  The first "new" line is the line imme‐
              diately following the line  previously  at  the  bottom  of  the
              screen.  Also highlights the target line after a g or p command.
              The  highlight is removed at the next command which causes move‐
              ment.  If the --status‐line option is in effect, the entire line
              (the width of the screen) is highlighted.  Otherwise,  only  the
              text  in the line is highlighted, unless the -J option is in ef‐
              fect, in which case only the status column is highlighted.

       -W or --HILITE‐UNREAD
              Like -w, but temporarily highlights the first new line after any
              forward movement command larger than one line.

       -x[4mn[24m,... or --tabs=[4mn[24m,...
              Sets tab stops.  If only one [4mn[24m is specified, tab stops  are  set
              at  multiples  of [4mn[24m.  If multiple values separated by commas are
              specified, tab stops are set at those positions, and  then  con‐
              tinue  with  the  same  spacing  as  the last two.  For example,
              "‐x9,17" will set tabs at positions 9, 17, 25, 33, etc.  The de‐
              fault for [4mn[24m is 8.

       -X or --no‐init
              Disables sending the termcap initialization and deinitialization
              strings to the terminal.  This is  sometimes  desirable  if  the
              deinitialization  string does something unnecessary, like clear‐
              ing the screen.

       -y[4mn[24m or --max‐forw‐scroll=[4mn[0m
              Specifies a maximum number of lines to scroll forward.  If it is
              necessary to scroll forward more than [4mn[24m lines, the screen is re‐
              painted instead.  The -c or -C option may  be  used  to  repaint
              from  the top of the screen if desired.  By default, any forward
              movement causes scrolling.

       -z[4mn[24m or --window=[4mn[24m or -[4mn[0m
              Changes the default scrolling window size to [4mn[24m lines.   The  de‐
              fault  is  one screenful.  The z and w commands can also be used
              to change the window size.  The "z" may be omitted for  compati‐
              bility  with some versions of [1mmore[22m(1).  If the number [4mn[24m is nega‐
              tive, it indicates [4mn[24m lines less than the  current  screen  size.
              For  example, if the screen is 24 lines, [4m-z-4[24m sets the scrolling
              window to 20 lines.  If the screen is resized to 40  lines,  the
              scrolling window automatically changes to 36 lines.

       -"[4mcc[24m or --quotes=[4mcc[0m
              Changes  the  filename quoting character.  This may be necessary
              if you are trying to name a file which contains both spaces  and
              quote  characters.  Followed by a single character, this changes
              the quote character to that character.  Filenames  containing  a
              space should then be surrounded by that character rather than by
              double  quotes.   Followed  by  two characters, changes the open
              quote to the first character, and the close quote to the  second
              character.  Filenames containing a space should then be preceded
              by  the  open  quote  character  and followed by the close quote
              character.  Note  that  even  after  the  quote  characters  are
              changed,  this  option  remains  -" (a dash followed by a double
              quote).

       -~ or --tilde
              Normally lines after end of file are displayed as a single tilde
              (~).  This option causes lines after end of file to be displayed
              as blank lines.

       -# or --shift
              Specifies the default number of positions to scroll horizontally
              in the RIGHTARROW and LEFTARROW commands.  If the number  speci‐
              fied  is  zero,  it  sets the default number of positions to one
              half of the screen width.  Alternately, the number may be speci‐
              fied as a fraction of the width of the screen, starting  with  a
              decimal  point:  .5  is  half  of  the screen width, .3 is three
              tenths of the screen width, and so on.  If the number is  speci‐
              fied as a fraction, the actual number of scroll positions is re‐
              calculated if the terminal window is resized.

       --cmd=[4mcommands[0m
              The  specified string is taken to be an initial command to [1mless[22m.
              This is similar to specifying "+[4mcommands[24m", except that  commands
              specified  by  --cmd  are not executed if [1mless [22mexits immediately
              due to the use of the -E or -F option, while commands  specified
              by the [1m+ [22moption are executed even if [1mless [22mexits immediately.

       --exit‐follow‐on‐close
              When  using  the  "F" command on a pipe, [1mless [22mwill automatically
              stop waiting for more data when the input side of  the  pipe  is
              closed.

       --file‐size
              If --file‐size is specified, [1mless [22mwill determine the size of the
              file  immediately  after opening the file.  Then the "=" command
              will display the number of lines in the file.  Normally this  is
              not  done, because it can be slow if the input file is non‐seek‐
              able (such as a pipe) and is large.

       --follow‐name
              Normally, if the input file is renamed while an F command is ex‐
              ecuting, [1mless [22mwill continue to display the contents of the orig‐
              inal file despite its name change.  If --follow‐name  is  speci‐
              fied,  during an F command [1mless [22mwill periodically attempt to re‐
              open the file by name.  If the reopen succeeds and the file is a
              different file from the original (which means that  a  new  file
              has  been  created  with  the same name as the original (now re‐
              named) file), [1mless [22mwill display the contents of that new file.

       --form‐feed
              When scrolling forward or backward in the file, stop if  a  line
              beginning  with a form feed character (^L) is reached.  This can
              be useful when viewing a file  which  uses  form  feeds  between
              pages.

       --header=[4mL[24m,[4mC[24m,[4mN[0m
              Sets  the  number  of  header lines and columns displayed on the
              screen.  The number of header lines is set to [4mL[24m.   If  [4mL[24m  is  0,
              header lines are disabled.  If [4mL[24m is empty or missing, the number
              of  header  lines is unchanged.  The number of header columns is
              set to [4mC[24m.  If [4mC[24m is 0, header columns are disabled.  If [4mC[24m is emp‐
              ty or missing, the number of header columns is  unchanged.   The
              first  header line is set to line number [4mN[24m in the file.  If [4mN[24m is
              empty or missing, it is taken to be the number of the line  cur‐
              rently displayed in the first line of the screen (if the --head‐
              er  command  has  been  issued  from  within [1mless[22m), or 1 (if the
              --header option has been given on the command line).   The  spe‐
              cial form "--header=-" disables header lines and header columns,
              and is equivalent to "--header=0,0".

              When  [4mL[24m  is  nonzero, the first [4mL[24m lines at the top of the screen
              are replaced with the [4mL[24m lines of the file beginning at  line  [4mN[24m,
              regardless of what part of the file is being viewed.  When head‐
              er lines are displayed, any file contents before the header line
              cannot  be  viewed.   When  [4mC[24m is nonzero, the first [4mC[24m characters
              displayed at the beginning of each line are  replaced  with  the
              first  [4mC[24m characters of the line, even if the rest of the line is
              scrolled horizontally.

              While the --header option  is  active,  lines  longer  than  the
              screen width are truncated, and the -S option is ignored.

       --incsearch
              Subsequent  search commands will be "incremental"; that is, [1mless[0m
              will advance to the next line containing the search  pattern  as
              each character of the pattern is typed in.

       --intr=[4mc[0m
              Use  the  character [4mc[24m instead of ^X to interrupt a read when the
              "Waiting for data" message is displayed.  [4mc[24m  must  be  an  ASCII
              character;  that  is,  one with a value between 1 and 127 inclu‐
              sive.  A caret followed by a single character  can  be  used  to
              specify a control character.

       --line‐num‐width=[4mn[0m
              Sets  the minimum width of the line number field when the -N op‐
              tion is in effect to [4mn[24m characters.  The default is 7.

       --match‐shift=[4mn[0m
              When -S is in effect, if a search match is not  visible  because
              it  is  shifted  to  the  left or right of the currently visible
              screen, the text will horizontally  shift  to  ensure  that  the
              search  match  is  visible.   This  option selects the column in
              which the first character of the search match will be placed af‐
              ter the shift.  In other words, there will be [4mn[24m characters visi‐
              ble to the left of the search match.

              Alternately, the number may be specified as a  fraction  of  the
              width  of  the screen, starting with a decimal point: .5 is half
              of the screen width, .3 is three tenths of the screen width, and
              so on.  If the number is specified as  a  fraction,  the  actual
              number  of scroll positions is recalculated if the terminal win‐
              dow is resized.

       --modelines=[4mn[0m
              Before displaying a file, [1mless [22mwill read the first  [4mn[24m  lines  to
              try  to find a vim‐compatible [4mmodeline[24m.  If [4mn[24m is zero, [1mless [22mdoes
              not try to find modelines.  By using a modeline, the file itself
              can specify the tab stops that should be used when viewing it.

              A modeline contains, anywhere in the line, a program name ("vi",
              "vim", "ex", or "less"), followed by a colon, possibly  followed
              by  the  word "set", and finally followed by zero or more option
              settings.  If the word "set" is used, option settings are  sepa‐
              rated  by spaces, and end at the first colon.  If the word "set"
              is not used, option settings may be separated by  either  spaces
              or  colons.   The  word "set" is required if the program name is
              "less" but optional if any of the other three  names  are  used.
              If any option setting is of the form "tabstop=[4mn[24m" or "ts=[4mn[24m", then
              tab  stops  are automatically set as if --tabs=[4mn[24m had been given.
              See the --tabs description for acceptable values of [4mn[24m.

       --mouse
              Enables mouse input: scrolling the mouse wheel down  moves  for‐
              ward  in  the file, scrolling the mouse wheel up moves backwards
              in the file, left‐click sets the "#" mark to the line where  the
              mouse  is clicked, and right‐click (or any other) returns to the
              "#" mark position.  Holding down the left  button  and  dragging
              also  moves  in the file.  If a left‐click is performed with the
              mouse cursor on an OSC 8 hyperlink, the hyperlink is selected as
              if by the ^O^N command.  If a left‐click is performed  with  the
              mouse  cursor  on  an OSC 8 hyperlink which is already selected,
              the hyperlink is opened as if by the ^O^O command.   The  number
              of  lines  to  scroll  when the wheel is moved can be set by the
              --wheel‐lines option.  Mouse input works only on terminals which
              support X11 mouse reporting, and on the Windows version of [1mless[22m.

       --MOUSE
              Like --mouse, except the direction scrolled on mouse wheel move‐
              ment is reversed.

       --no‐edit‐warn
              Don’t print a warning message when using the v command on a file
              which was opened using a LESSOPEN preprocessor  (see  the  INPUT
              PREPROCESSOR section below).

       --no‐keypad
              Disables  sending the keypad initialization and deinitialization
              strings to the terminal.  This is sometimes useful if the keypad
              strings make the numeric keypad behave in an undesirable manner.

       --no‐histdups
              This option changes the behavior so that if a search  string  or
              file  name  is  typed  in, and the same string is already in the
              history list, the existing copy is removed from the history list
              before the new one is added.  Thus, a given string  will  appear
              only  once  in  the history list.  Normally, a string may appear
              multiple times.

       --no‐number‐headers
              Header lines (defined via the --header option) are not  assigned
              line numbers.  Line number 1 is assigned to the first line after
              any header lines.

       --no‐paste
              If the terminal supports xterm‐compatible "bracketed paste", any
              text  pasted  into [1mless [22mis ignored, except that one line of text
              may be pasted into the command line at the bottom of the  screen
              (search  strings,  file names, etc).  That is, the first newline
              of text pasted into the command line and any text  that  follows
              it is ignored.

       --no‐search‐header‐lines
              Searches  do  not include header lines, but still include header
              columns.

       --no‐search‐header‐columns
              Searches do not include header columns, but still include header
              lines.

       --no‐search‐headers
              Searches do not include header lines or header columns.

       --no‐vbell
              Disables the terminal’s visual bell.

       --proc‐backspace
              If set, backspaces are handled as if neither the -u  option  nor
              the -U option were set.  That is, a backspace adjacent to an un‐
              derscore  causes  text  to be displayed in underline mode, and a
              backspace between identical characters cause  text  to  be  dis‐
              played  in  boldface  mode.  This option overrides the -u and -U
              options, so that display of backspaces can be  controlled  sepa‐
              rate from tabs and carriage returns.  If not set, backspace dis‐
              play is controlled by the -u and -U options.

       --PROC‐BACKSPACE
              If  set,  backspaces  are  handled as if the -U option were set;
              that is backspaces are treated as control characters.

       --proc‐return
              If set, carriage returns are handled as if neither the -u option
              nor the -U option were set.  That is, a carriage return  immedi‐
              ately before a newline is deleted.  This option overrides the -u
              and  -U options, so that display of carriage returns can be con‐
              trolled separate from that of backspaces and tabs.  If not  set,
              carriage return display is controlled by the -u and -U options.

       --PROC‐RETURN
              If  set,  carriage  returns are handled as if the -U option were
              set; that is carriage returns are treated as control characters.

       --proc‐tab
              If set, tabs are handled as if the -U option were not set.  That
              is, tabs are expanded to spaces.  This option overrides  the  -U
              option,  so that display of tabs can be controlled separate from
              that of backspaces and carriage returns.  If not set,  tab  dis‐
              play is controlled by the -U option.

       --PROC‐TAB
              If  set,  tabs are handled as if the -U option were set; that is
              tabs are treated as control characters.

       --redraw‐on‐quit
              When  quitting,  after  sending  the  terminal  deinitialization
              string, redraws the entire last screen.  On terminals whose ter‐
              minal deinitialization string causes the terminal to switch from
              an  alternate  screen, this makes the last screenful of the cur‐
              rent file remain visible after [1mless [22mhas quit.

       --rscroll=[4mc[0m
              This option changes the character used to mark truncated  lines.
              It may begin with a two‐character attribute indicator like LESS‐
              BINFMT  does.   If  there is no attribute indicator, standout is
              used.  If set to "-", truncated lines are not marked.

       --save‐marks
              Save marks in the history file, so  marks  are  retained  across
              different invocations of [1mless[22m.

       --search‐options=[4m...[0m
              Sets  default search modifiers.  The value is a string of one or
              more of the characters E, F, K, N, R or W.  Setting any of these
              has the same effect as typing that control character at the  be‐
              ginning of every search pattern.  For example, setting --search‐
              options=W  is  the  same  as typing ^W at the beginning of every
              pattern.  The value may also contain a digit between  1  and  5,
              which has the same effect as typing ^S followed by that digit at
              the  beginning  of every search pattern.  The value "‐" disables
              all default search modifiers.

       --show‐preproc‐errors
              If a preprocessor produces data, then exits with a non‐zero exit
              code, [1mless [22mwill display a warning.

       --status‐col‐width=[4mn[0m
              Sets the width of the status column when the -J option is in ef‐
              fect.  The default is 2 characters.

       --status‐line
              If a line is marked, the entire line (rather than just the  sta‐
              tus  column)  is highlighted.  Also lines highlighted due to the
              -w option will have the entire line highlighted.  If --use‐color
              is set, the line is colored rather than highlighted.

       --use‐backslash
              This option changes the interpretations of options which  follow
              this one.  After the --use‐backslash option, any backslash in an
              option  string  is  removed and the following character is taken
              literally.  This allows a dollar sign to be included  in  option
              strings.

       --use‐color
              Enables  colored  text  in various places.  The -D option can be
              used to change the colors.  Colored text works only if the  ter‐
              minal  supports  ANSI  color  escape  sequences  (as  defined in
              https://www.ecma‐international.org/publications‐and‐
              standards/standards/ecma‐48).

       --wheel‐lines=[4mn[0m
              Set the number of lines  to  scroll  when  the  mouse  wheel  is
              scrolled  and  the  --mouse or --MOUSE option is in effect.  The
              default is 1 line.

       --wordwrap
              When the -S option is not in use, wrap each line at a  space  or
              tab  if possible, so that a word is not split between two lines.
              The default is to wrap at any character.

       --     A command line argument of "--" marks the end  of  option  argu‐
              ments.   Any  arguments  following this are interpreted as file‐
              names.  This can be useful when viewing a file whose name begins
              with a "-" or "+".  Otherwise, option arguments and filename ar‐
              guments can be intermixed; that is, option arguments do not need
              to appear before  filename  arguments,  unless  the  environment
              variable POSIXLY_CORRECT is set.

       +      If  a  command  line option begins with [1m+[22m, the remainder of that
              option is taken to be an initial command to [1mless[22m.  For  example,
              +G  tells  [1mless  [22mto start at the end of the file rather than the
              beginning, and +/xyz tells it to start at the  first  occurrence
              of  "xyz"  in  the file.  As a special case, +<number> acts like
              +<number>g; that is, it starts the display at the specified line
              number (however, see the caveat under the  "g"  command  above).
              If  the  option  starts  with ++, the initial command applies to
              every file being viewed, not just the first one.  The +  command
              described previously may also be used to set (or change) an ini‐
              tial command for every file.  Also see the --cmd option.

[1mLINE EDITING[0m
       When  entering a command line at the bottom of the screen (for example,
       a filename for the :e command, or the pattern for  a  search  command),
       certain keys can be used to manipulate the command line.  Most commands
       have  an alternate form in [ brackets ] which can be used if a key does
       not exist on a particular keyboard.  (Note  that  the  forms  beginning
       with  ESC do not work on some MS‐DOS and Windows systems because ESC is
       the line erase character.)  Any of these special keys  may  be  entered
       literally  by  preceding  it with the "literal" character, either ^V or
       ^A.  A backslash itself may also be entered literally by  entering  two
       backslashes.

       LEFTARROW [ ESC‐h ]
              Move the cursor one space to the left.

       RIGHTARROW [ ESC‐l ]
              Move the cursor one space to the right.

       ^LEFTARROW [ ESC‐b or ESC‐LEFTARROW ]
              (That  is, CONTROL and LEFTARROW simultaneously.)  Move the cur‐
              sor one word to the left.

       ^RIGHTARROW [ ESC‐w or ESC‐RIGHTARROW ]
              (That is, CONTROL and RIGHTARROW simultaneously.)  Move the cur‐
              sor one word to the right.

       HOME [ ESC‐0 ]
              Move the cursor to the beginning of the line.

       END [ ESC‐$ ]
              Move the cursor to the end of the line.

       BACKSPACE
              Delete the character to the left of the cursor,  or  cancel  the
              command if the command line is empty.

       DELETE or [ ESC‐x ]
              Delete the character under the cursor.

       ^BACKSPACE [ ESC‐BACKSPACE ]
              (That  is,  CONTROL  and  BACKSPACE simultaneously.)  Delete the
              word to the left of the cursor.

       ^DELETE [ ESC‐X or ESC‐DELETE ]
              (That is, CONTROL and DELETE simultaneously.)  Delete  the  word
              under the cursor.

       UPARROW [ ESC‐k ]
              Retrieve  the  previous  command  line.  If you first enter some
              text and then press UPARROW, it will retrieve the previous  com‐
              mand which begins with that text.

       DOWNARROW [ ESC‐j ]
              Retrieve  the  next  command line.  If you first enter some text
              and then press DOWNARROW, it  will  retrieve  the  next  command
              which begins with that text.

       TAB    Complete  the partial filename to the left of the cursor.  If it
              matches more than one filename, the first match is entered  into
              the  command  line.   Repeated  TABs  will  cycle thru the other
              matching filenames.  If the completed filename is a directory, a
              "/" is appended to the filename.  (On MS‐DOS  and  Windows  sys‐
              tems,  a "\" is appended.)  The environment variable LESSSEPARA‐
              TOR can be used to specify a different character to append to  a
              directory name.

       BACKTAB [ ESC‐TAB ]
              Like, TAB, but cycles in the reverse direction thru the matching
              filenames.

       ^L     Complete  the partial filename to the left of the cursor.  If it
              matches more than one filename, all matches are entered into the
              command line (if they fit).

       ^U (Unix and OS/2) or ESC (MS‐DOS and Windows)
              Delete the entire command line, or cancel  the  command  if  the
              cursor  is  at  the  beginning of the command line.  If you have
              changed your line‐kill character in Unix to something other than
              ^U, that character is used instead of ^U.

       ^G     Delete the entire command line and return to the main prompt.

[1mKEY BINDINGS[0m
       You may define your own [1mless [22mcommands  by  creating  a  lesskey  source
       file.   This file specifies a set of command keys and an action associ‐
       ated with each key.  You may also change  the  line‐editing  keys  (see
       LINE  EDITING),  and  set  environment variables used by [1mless[22m.  See the
       [1mlesskey[22m(1) manual page for details about the file format.

       If the environment variable LESSKEYIN is set, [1mless  [22muses  that  as  the
       name  of  the lesskey source file.  Otherwise, [1mless [22mlooks in a standard
       place for the lesskey source file: On Unix systems, [1mless  [22mlooks  for  a
       lesskey   file   called   "$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/lesskey"   or  "$HOME/.con‐
       fig/lesskey" or "$HOME/.lesskey".  On MS‐DOS and Windows systems,  [1mless[0m
       looks  for  a  lesskey  file  called "$HOME/_lesskey", and if it is not
       found there, then looks for a lesskey file called "_lesskey" in any di‐
       rectory specified in the PATH environment variable.  On  OS/2  systems,
       [1mless  [22mlooks for a lesskey file called "$HOME/lesskey.ini", and if it is
       not found, then looks for a lesskey file called  "lesskey.ini"  in  any
       directory  specified  in  the  INIT environment variable, and if it not
       found there, then looks for a lesskey file called "lesskey.ini" in  any
       directory specified in the PATH environment variable.

       A  system‐wide  lesskey  source  file may also be set up to provide key
       bindings.  If a key is defined in both a local lesskey file and in  the
       system‐wide  file,  key bindings in the local file take precedence over
       those  in  the  system‐wide  file.    If   the   environment   variable
       LESSKEYIN_SYSTEM  is set, [1mless [22muses that as the name of the system‐wide
       lesskey file.  Otherwise, [1mless [22mlooks in a standard place for  the  sys‐
       tem‐wide lesskey file: On Unix systems, the system‐wide lesskey file is
       /usr/local/etc/syslesskey.   (However, if [1mless [22mwas built with a differ‐
       ent sysconf directory than /usr/local/etc, that directory is where  the
       sysless file is found.)  On MS‐DOS and Windows systems, the system‐wide
       lesskey  file  is  c:\_syslesskey.   On  OS/2  systems, the system‐wide
       lesskey file is c:\syslesskey.ini.

       Older versions of [1mless [22m(before v582) used lesskey files with  a  binary
       format,  produced  by the [1mlesskey [22mprogram. It is no longer necessary to
       use the [1mlesskey [22mprogram.

[1mINPUT PREPROCESSOR[0m
       You may define an "input preprocessor" for [1mless[22m.  Before [1mless  [22mopens  a
       file,  it first gives the input preprocessor a chance to modify the way
       the contents of the file are displayed.  An input preprocessor is  sim‐
       ply  an executable program (or shell script), which writes the contents
       of the file to a different file, called the replacement file.  The con‐
       tents of the replacement file are then displayed in place of  the  con‐
       tents  of the original file.  However, it will appear to the user as if
       the original file is opened; that is, [1mless [22mwill  display  the  original
       filename as the name of the current file.

       An  input preprocessor receives one command line argument, the original
       filename, as entered by the user.  It  should  create  the  replacement
       file,  and when finished, print the name of the replacement file to its
       standard output.  If the input preprocessor does not output a  replace‐
       ment  filename, [1mless [22muses the original file, as normal.  The input pre‐
       processor is not called when viewing standard input.  To set up an  in‐
       put  preprocessor,  set  the LESSOPEN environment variable to a command
       line which will invoke your  input  preprocessor.   This  command  line
       should  include  one  occurrence  of the string "%s", which will be re‐
       placed by the filename when the input preprocessor command is invoked.

       When [1mless [22mcloses a file opened in such a way, it will call another pro‐
       gram, called the input postprocessor, which  may  perform  any  desired
       clean‐up  action  (such  as  deleting  the  replacement file created by
       LESSOPEN).  This program receives two command line arguments, the orig‐
       inal filename as entered by the user, and the name of  the  replacement
       file.   To set up an input postprocessor, set the LESSCLOSE environment
       variable to a command line which will invoke your input  postprocessor.
       It  may  include  two  occurrences of the string "%s"; the first is re‐
       placed with the original name of the file and the second with the  name
       of the replacement file, which was output by LESSOPEN.

       For  example, on many Unix systems, these two scripts will allow you to
       keep files in compressed format, but still let [1mless [22mview them directly:

       lessopen.sh:
            #! /bin/sh
            case "$1" in
            *.Z) TEMPFILE=$(mktemp)
                 uncompress -c $1  >$TEMPFILE  2>/dev/null
                 if [ -s $TEMPFILE ]; then
                      echo $TEMPFILE
                 else
                      rm -f $TEMPFILE
                 fi
                 ;;
            esac

       lessclose.sh:
            #! /bin/sh
            rm $2

       To use these scripts, put them both where they can be executed and  set
       LESSOPEN="lessopen.sh %s",  and  LESSCLOSE="lessclose.sh %s %s".   More
       complex LESSOPEN and LESSCLOSE scripts may be written to  accept  other
       types of compressed files, and so on.

       It  is  also  possible to set up an input preprocessor to pipe the file
       data directly to [1mless[22m, rather than putting the data into a  replacement
       file.  This avoids the need to decompress the entire file before start‐
       ing to view it.  An input preprocessor that works this way is called an
       input  pipe.   An input pipe, instead of writing the name of a replace‐
       ment file on its standard output, writes the entire contents of the re‐
       placement file on its standard output.  If  the  input  pipe  does  not
       write  any characters on its standard output, then there is no replace‐
       ment file and [1mless [22muses the original file, as normal.  To use an  input
       pipe,  make  the first character in the LESSOPEN environment variable a
       vertical bar (|) to signify that the input  preprocessor  is  an  input
       pipe.   As  with  non‐pipe input preprocessors, the command string must
       contain one occurrence of %s, which is replaced with  the  filename  of
       the input file.

       For  example, on many Unix systems, this script will work like the pre‐
       vious example scripts:

       lesspipe.sh:
            #! /bin/sh
            case "$1" in
            *.Z) uncompress -c $1  2>/dev/null
                 ;;
            *)   exit 1
                 ;;
            esac
            exit $?

       To  use  this  script,  put  it  where  it  can  be  executed  and  set
       LESSOPEN="|lesspipe.sh %s".

       Note that a preprocessor cannot output an empty file, since that is in‐
       terpreted  as meaning there is no replacement, and the original file is
       used.  To avoid this, if LESSOPEN starts with two  vertical  bars,  the
       exit  status  of  the script determines the behavior when the output is
       empty.  If the output is empty and the exit status is zero,  the  empty
       output  is  considered  to be replacement text.  If the output is empty
       and the exit status is nonzero, the original file is used.  For compat‐
       ibility with previous versions of [1mless[22m, if LESSOPEN  starts  with  only
       one vertical bar, the exit status of the preprocessor is ignored.

       When  an input pipe is used, a LESSCLOSE postprocessor can be used, but
       it is usually not necessary since there is no replacement file to clean
       up.  In this case, the replacement file name passed  to  the  LESSCLOSE
       postprocessor is "-".

       For  compatibility with previous versions of [1mless[22m, the input preproces‐
       sor or pipe is not used if [1mless [22mis viewing standard input.  However, if
       the first character of LESSOPEN is a dash (-), the  input  preprocessor
       is  used  on  standard input as well as other files.  In this case, the
       dash is not considered to be part  of  the  preprocessor  command.   If
       standard input is being viewed, the input preprocessor is passed a file
       name  consisting of a single dash.  Similarly, if the first two charac‐
       ters of LESSOPEN are vertical bar and dash (|-) or  two  vertical  bars
       and  a  dash (||-), the input pipe is used on standard input as well as
       other files.  Again, in this case the dash is not considered to be part
       of the input pipe command.

[1mNATIONAL CHARACTER SETS[0m
       There are five types of characters in the input file:

       normal characters
              can be displayed directly to the screen.

       control characters
              should not be displayed directly, but are expected to  be  found
              in ordinary text files (such as backspace and tab).

       binary characters
              should  not  be  displayed  directly  and are not expected to be
              found in text files.

       composing characters
              are not displayed separately, but modify the display of the pre‐
              ceding character. (Only when LESSCHARSET is "utf8".)

       deleted characters
              are simply deleted from the input and not displayed.  (Only when
              LESSCHARSET is "utf8".)

       A "character set" is simply a description of which characters are to be
       considered normal, control, and binary.   The  LESSCHARSET  environment
       variable  may  be  used to select a character set.  Possible values for
       LESSCHARSET are:

       ascii  BS, TAB, NL, CR, and formfeed are control characters, all  chars
              with  values  between  32 and 126 are normal, and all others are
              binary.

       iso8859
              Selects an ISO 8859 character set.  This is the same  as  ASCII,
              except  characters  between  160  and  255 are treated as normal
              characters.

       latin1 Same as iso8859.

       latin9 Same as iso8859.

       dos    Selects a character set appropriate for MS‐DOS.

       ebcdic Selects an EBCDIC character set.

       IBM‐1047
              Selects an EBCDIC character set used by  OS/390  Unix  Services.
              This  is the EBCDIC analogue of latin1.  You get similar results
              by setting either LESSCHARSET=IBM‐1047 or LC_CTYPE=en_US in your
              environment.

       koi8‐r Selects a Russian character set.

       next   Selects a character set appropriate for NeXT computers.

       utf‐8  Selects the UTF‐8 encoding  of  the  ISO  10646  character  set.
              UTF‐8  is  special  in that it supports multi‐byte characters in
              the input file.  It is the only character set that supports mul‐
              ti‐byte characters.

       windows
              Selects a character set appropriate for  Microsoft  Windows  (cp
              1252).

       In  rare cases, it may be desired to tailor [1mless [22mto use a character set
       other than the ones definable by LESSCHARSET.  In this case, the  envi‐
       ronment variable LESSCHARDEF can be used to define a character set.  It
       should be set to a string where each character in the string represents
       one  character  in  the character set.  The character "." is used for a
       normal character, "c" for control, and "b" for binary.  A decimal  num‐
       ber  may  be  used  for  repetition.  For example, "bccc4b." would mean
       character 0 is binary, 1, 2 and 3 are control, 4, 5, 6 and 7 are  bina‐
       ry, and 8 is normal.  All characters after the last are taken to be the
       same  as  the last, so characters 9 through 255 would be normal.  (This
       is an example, and does not necessarily represent  any  real  character
       set.)

       This  table  shows the value of LESSCHARDEF which is equivalent to each
       of the possible values for LESSCHARSET:
            ascii      8bcccbcc18b95.b
            dos        8bcccbcc12bc5b95.b.
            ebcdic     5bc6bcc7bcc41b.9b7.9b5.b..8b6.10b6.b9.7b
                       9.8b8.17b3.3b9.7b9.8b8.6b10.b.b.b.
            IBM‐1047   4cbcbc3b9cbccbccbb4c6bcc5b3cbbc4bc4bccbc
                       191.b
            iso8859    8bcccbcc18b95.33b.
            koi8‐r     8bcccbcc18b95.b128.
            latin1     8bcccbcc18b95.33b.
            next       8bcccbcc18b95.bb125.bb

       If neither LESSCHARSET nor LESSCHARDEF is set, but any of  the  strings
       "UTF‐8",  "UTF8", "utf‐8" or "utf8" is found in the LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE or
       LANG environment variables, then the default character set is utf‐8.

       If that string is not found, but your system supports the [1msetlocale [22min‐
       terface, [1mless [22mwill use setlocale to determine the character set.   set‐
       locale  is controlled by setting the LANG or LC_CTYPE environment vari‐
       ables.

       Finally, if the [4msetlocale[24m interface is also not available, the  default
       character set is utf‐8.

       Control  and  binary  characters  are  displayed  in  standout (reverse
       video).  Each such character is displayed in caret notation if possible
       (e.g. ^A for control‐A).  Caret notation is used only if inverting  the
       0100 bit results in a normal printable character.  Otherwise, the char‐
       acter  is displayed as a hex number in angle brackets.  This format can
       be changed by setting the LESSBINFMT environment variable.   LESSBINFMT
       may begin with a "*" and one character to select the display attribute:
       "*k"  is  blinking, "*d" is bold, "*u" is underlined, "*s" is standout,
       and "*n" is normal.  If LESSBINFMT does not begin with  a  "*",  normal
       attribute  is  assumed.   The remainder of LESSBINFMT is a string which
       may include one printf‐style escape sequence (a % followed by x, X,  o,
       d,  etc.).   For  example, if LESSBINFMT is "*u[%x]", binary characters
       are displayed in underlined hexadecimal surrounded  by  brackets.   The
       default  if no LESSBINFMT is specified is "*s<%02X>".  Warning: the re‐
       sult of expanding the character via LESSBINFMT must  be  less  than  31
       characters.

       When the character set is utf‐8, the LESSUTFBINFMT environment variable
       acts similarly to LESSBINFMT but it applies to Unicode code points that
       were  successfully  decoded but are unsuitable for display (e.g., unas‐
       signed code points).  Its default  value  is  "<U+%04lX>".   Note  that
       LESSUTFBINFMT  and  LESSBINFMT  share  their  display attribute setting
       ("*x") so specifying one will affect both; LESSUTFBINFMT is read  after
       LESSBINFMT  so  its  setting,  if any, will have priority.  Problematic
       octets in a UTF‐8 file (octets of a truncated  sequence,  octets  of  a
       complete  but  non‐shortest  form  sequence,  invalid octets, and stray
       trailing octets) are displayed individually using LESSBINFMT so  as  to
       facilitate diagnostic of how the UTF‐8 file is ill‐formed.

       When  the  character set is utf‐8, in rare cases it may be desirable to
       override the Unicode definition of the type of certain characters.  For
       example, characters in a Private Use Area are normally treated as bina‐
       ry characters, but if you are using a custom font with printable  char‐
       acters  in  that  range, it may be desirable to tell [1mless [22mto treat such
       characters as printable.  This can be done by setting the LESSUTFCHARD‐
       EF environment variable to a comma‐separated list of [4mcharacter[24m [4mtype[24m de‐
       finitions.  Each character type definition consists of either one hexa‐
       decimal codepoint or a pair of codepoints separated by a dash, followed
       by a colon and a type character.  Each hexadecimal  codepoint  may  op‐
       tionally be preceded by a "U" or "U+".  If a pair of codepoints is giv‐
       en, the type is set for all characters inclusively between the two val‐
       ues.  If there are multiple comma‐separated codepoint values, they must
       be in ascending numerical order.  The type character may be one of:

              p      A normal printable character.

              w      A wide (2‐space) printable character.

              b      A binary (non‐printable) character.

              c      A composing (zero width) character.

              d      A  deleted character (deleted from the input and not dis‐
                     played).

       For example, setting LESSUTFCHARDEF to

            E000‐F8FF:p,F0000‐FFFFD:p,100000‐10FFFD:p

       would make all Private Use Area characters be treated as printable.

       By default, emoji modifiers, components  and  variation  selectors  are
       deleted  because  many terminals do not display them correctly.  If you
       use a terminal which does display some or all of  them  correctly,  you
       can  cause  to  be displayed by setting LESSUTFCHARDEF to treat them as
       composing characters.  For example, this sets  them  all  to  composing
       characters:

            FE00‐FE0F:c,1F3FB‐1F3FF:c,1F9B0‐1F9B3:c,E0100‐E01EF:c


[1mPROMPTS[0m
       The  -P option allows you to tailor the prompt to your preference.  The
       string given to the -P option replaces  the  specified  prompt  string.
       Certain characters in the string are interpreted specially.  The prompt
       mechanism  is  rather complicated to provide flexibility, but the ordi‐
       nary user need not understand the details of constructing  personalized
       prompt strings.

       A  percent sign followed by a single character is expanded according to
       what the following character is.  (References to the  input  file  size
       below refer to the preprocessed size, if an input preprocessor is being
       used.)

       %b[4mX[24m    Replaced  by the byte offset into the current input file.  The b
              is followed by a single character (shown as [4mX[24m above) which spec‐
              ifies the line whose byte offset is to be used.  If the  charac‐
              ter  is a "t", the byte offset of the top line in the display is
              used, an "m" means use the middle line, a "b" means use the bot‐
              tom line, a "B" means use the line just after the  bottom  line,
              and  a  "j"  means use the "target" line, as specified by the -j
              option.

       %B     Replaced by the size of the current input file.

       %c     Replaced by the column number of the text appearing in the first
              column of the screen.

       %d[4mX[24m    Replaced by the page number of a line in the  input  file.   The
              line to be used is determined by the [4mX[24m, as with the %b option.

       %D     Replaced  by  the  number of pages in the input file, or equiva‐
              lently, the page number of the last line in the input file.

       %E     Replaced by the name of the editor (from the VISUAL  environment
              variable,  or  the  EDITOR environment variable if VISUAL is not
              defined).  See the discussion of the LESSEDIT feature below.

       %f     Replaced by the name of the current input file.

       %F     Replaced by the last component of the name of the current  input
              file.

       %g     Replaced  by  the  shell‐escaped name of the current input file.
              This is useful when the expanded string will be used in a  shell
              command, such as in LESSEDIT.

       %i     Replaced  by  the index of the current file in the list of input
              files.

       %l[4mX[24m    Replaced by the line number of a line in the  input  file.   The
              line to be used is determined by the [4mX[24m, as with the %b option.

       %L     Replaced by the line number of the last line in the input file.

       %m     Replaced by the total number of input files.

       %o     Replaced  by  the URI of the currently selected OSC 8 hyperlink,
              or a question mark if no hyperlink is selected.  This is used by
              OSC 8 handlers as explained in the ^O^O command description.

       %p[4mX[24m    Replaced by the percent into the current input  file,  based  on
              byte  offsets.  The line used is determined by the [4mX[24m as with the
              %b option.

       %P[4mX[24m    Replaced by the percent into the current input  file,  based  on
              line  numbers.  The line used is determined by the [4mX[24m as with the
              %b option.

       %s     Same as %B.

       %t     Causes any trailing spaces to be removed.  Usually used  at  the
              end of the string, but may appear anywhere.

       %T     Normally  expands  to the word "file".  However if viewing files
              via a tags list using the -t option,  it  expands  to  the  word
              "tag".

       %x     Replaced by the name of the next input file in the list.

       If any item is unknown (for example, the file size if input is a pipe),
       a question mark is printed instead.

       The  format  of  the  prompt string can be changed depending on certain
       conditions.  A question mark followed by a single character  acts  like
       an  "IF": depending on the following character, a condition is evaluat‐
       ed.  If the condition is true, any characters  following  the  question
       mark  and  condition  character,  up  to  a period, are included in the
       prompt.  If the condition is false, such characters are  not  included.
       A  colon appearing between the question mark and the period can be used
       to establish an "ELSE": any characters between the colon and the period
       are included in the string if and only if the IF  condition  is  false.
       Condition characters (which follow a question mark) may be:

       ?a     True if any characters have been included in the prompt so far.

       ?b[4mX[24m    True if the byte offset of the specified line is known.

       ?B     True if the size of current input file is known.

       ?c     True if the text is horizontally shifted (%c is not zero).

       ?d[4mX[24m    True if the page number of the specified line is known.

       ?e     True if at end‐of‐file.

       ?f     True  if  there is an input filename (that is, if input is not a
              pipe).

       ?l[4mX[24m    True if the line number of the specified line is known.

       ?L     True if the line number of the last line in the file is known.

       ?m     True if there is more than one input file.

       ?n     True if this is the first prompt in a new input file.

       ?p[4mX[24m    True if the percent into the current input file, based  on  byte
              offsets, of the specified line is known.

       ?P[4mX[24m    True  if  the percent into the current input file, based on line
              numbers, of the specified line is known.

       ?s     Same as "?B".

       ?x     True if there is a next input file (that is, if the current  in‐
              put file is not the last one).

       Any characters other than the special ones (question mark, colon, peri‐
       od,  percent,  and backslash) become literally part of the prompt.  Any
       of the special characters may be included in the  prompt  literally  by
       preceding it with a backslash.

       Some examples:

       ?f%f:Standard input.

       This  prompt prints the filename, if known; otherwise the string "Stan‐
       dard input".

       ?f%f .?ltLine %lt:?pt%pt\%:?btByte %bt:‐...

       This prompt would print the filename, if known.  The filename  is  fol‐
       lowed  by  the  line  number, if known, otherwise the percent if known,
       otherwise the byte offset if known.  Otherwise, a dash is printed.  No‐
       tice how each question mark has a matching period, and how the %  after
       the %pt is included literally by escaping it with a backslash.

       ?n?f%f .?m(%T %i of %m) ..?e(END) ?x‐ Next\: %x..%t

       This  prints  the  filename if this is the first prompt in a file, fol‐
       lowed by the "file N of N" message if there  is  more  than  one  input
       file.   Then,  if  we are at end‐of‐file, the string "(END)" is printed
       followed by the name of the next file, if there is one.   Finally,  any
       trailing spaces are truncated.  This is the default prompt.  For refer‐
       ence,  here  are  the defaults for the other two prompts (-m and -M re‐
       spectively).  Each is broken into two lines here for readability only.

       ?n?f%f .?m(%T %i of %m) ..?e(END) ?x‐ Next\: %x.:
            ?pB%pB\%:byte %bB?s/%s...%t

       ?f%f .?n?m(%T %i of %m) ..?ltlines %lt‐%lb?L/%L. :
            byte %bB?s/%s. .?e(END) ?x‐ Next\: %x.:?pB%pB\%..%t

       And here is the default message produced by the = command:

       ?f%f .?m(%T %i of %m) .?ltlines %lt‐%lb?L/%L. .
            byte %bB?s/%s. ?e(END) :?pB%pB\%..%t

       The prompt expansion features are also used for another purpose: if  an
       environment  variable LESSEDIT is defined, it is used as the command to
       be executed when the v command is invoked.  The LESSEDIT string is  ex‐
       panded  in  the  same way as the prompt strings.  The default value for
       LESSEDIT is:

            %E ?lm+%lm. %g

       Note that this expands to the editor name, followed by a + and the line
       number, followed by the shell‐escaped file name.  If your  editor  does
       not  accept the "+linenumber" syntax, or has other differences in invo‐
       cation syntax, the LESSEDIT variable can be changed to modify this  de‐
       fault.

[1mSECURITY[0m
       When  the  environment  variable LESSSECURE is set to 1, [1mless [22mruns in a
       "secure" mode.  In this mode, these features are disabled:

       edit      the edit command (v)

       examine   the examine command (:e)

       glob      metacharacters such as * in filenames,
                 and filename completion (TAB, ^L)

       history   history file

       lesskey   use of lesskey files (‐k and --lesskey‐src)

       lessopen  input preprocessor (LESSOPEN environment variable)

       logfile   log files (s and -o)

       osc8      opening OSC 8 links (^O^O)

       pipe      the pipe command (|)

       shell     the shell and pshell commands (! and #)

       stop      stopping [1mless [22mvia a SIGTSTP signal

       tags      use of tags files (‐t)

       The LESSSECURE_ALLOW environment variable can be set to  a  comma‐sepa‐
       rated  list  of  names  of  features which are selectively enabled when
       LESSSECURE is set.  Each feature name is the first word in each line in
       the above list.  A feature name may be abbreviated as long as  the  ab‐
       breviation   is   unambiguous.    For   example,  if  LESSSECURE=1  and
       LESSSECURE_ALLOW=hist,edit were set, all of the above features would be
       disabled except for history files and the edit command.

       Less can also be compiled to be permanently in "secure" mode.  In  that
       case, the LESSSECURE and LESSSECURE_ALLOW variables are ignored.

[1mCOMPATIBILITY WITH MORE[0m
       If the environment variable LESS_IS_MORE is set to 1, or if the program
       is  invoked  via  a file link named "more" and the environment variable
       LESS_IS_MORE is not set to 0, [1mless [22mbehaves (mostly) in conformance with
       the POSIX [1mmore[22m(1) command specification.  In this  mode,  less  behaves
       differently in these ways:

       The -e option works differently.  If the -e option is not set, [1mless [22mbe‐
       haves  as if the -e option were set.  If the -e option is set, [1mless [22mbe‐
       haves as if the -E option were set.

       The -m option works differently.  If the -m  option  is  not  set,  the
       medium  prompt  is used, and it is prefixed with the string "--More--".
       If the -m option is set, the short prompt is used.

       The -n option acts like the -z option.  The normal behavior of  the  -n
       option is unavailable in this mode.

       The  parameter  to  the  -p option is taken to be a [1mless [22mcommand rather
       than a search pattern.

       The LESS environment variable is  ignored,  and  the  MORE  environment
       variable is used in its place.

[1mENVIRONMENT VARIABLES[0m
       Environment variables may be specified either in the system environment
       as  usual,  or  in a [1mlesskey[22m(1) file.  If environment variables are de‐
       fined in more than one place, variables defined in a local lesskey file
       take precedence over variables defined in the system environment, which
       take precedence over variables defined in the system‐wide lesskey file.

       COLUMNS
              Sets the number of columns on the screen.  Takes precedence over
              the number of columns specified by the TERM variable.   (But  if
              you  have  a  windowing  system  which  supports  TIOCGWINSZ  or
              WIOCGETD, the window system’s idea  of  the  screen  size  takes
              precedence over the LINES and COLUMNS environment variables.)

       EDITOR The name of the editor (used for the v command).

       HOME   Name  of  the user’s home directory (used to find a lesskey file
              on Unix and OS/2 systems).

       HOMEDRIVE, HOMEPATH
              Concatenation of the HOMEDRIVE and  HOMEPATH  environment  vari‐
              ables is the name of the user’s home directory if the HOME vari‐
              able is not set (only in the Windows version).

       INIT   Name  of  the user’s init directory (used to find a lesskey file
              on OS/2 systems).

       LANG   Language for determining the character set.

       LC_CTYPE
              Language for determining the character set.

       LESS   Options which are passed to [1mless [22mautomatically.

       LESSANSIENDCHARS
              Characters which may end an ANSI color escape sequence  (default
              "m").

       LESSANSIMIDCHARS
              Characters  which  may  appear between the ESC character and the
              end  character  in  an  ANSI  color  escape  sequence   (default
              "0123456789:;[?!"'#%()*+ ").

       LESSANSIOSCALLOW
              A comma‐separated list of OSC types which are output directly to
              the  terminal  when  -R is in effect (default "8"; that is, only
              OSC 8 sequences are output directly).

       LESSANSIOSCCHARS
              Characters which may follow an ESC character to mark  the  start
              of  an  "OS  Command" sequence.  All characters that follow this
              character up to a String Terminator (ESC‐backslash or  BEL)  are
              considered  to  be part of the OSC sequence (default "]").  If a
              character in LESSANSIOSCCHARS is followed by  an  asterisk,  se‐
              quences  that begin with that character in the file contents are
              passed through to the terminal; otherwise  only  sequences  that
              appear in a prompt string are passed through.

       LESSBINFMT
              Format for displaying non‐printable, non‐control characters.

       LESSCHARDEF
              Defines a character set.

       LESSCHARSET
              Selects a predefined character set.

       LESSCLOSE
              Command line to invoke the (optional) input‐postprocessor.

       LESSECHO
              Name of the lessecho program (default "lessecho").  The lessecho
              program  is needed to expand metacharacters, such as * and ?, in
              filenames on Unix systems.

       LESSEDIT
              Editor prototype string (used for the v command).   See  discus‐
              sion under PROMPTS.

       LESSGLOBALTAGS
              Name  of  the command used by the -t option to find global tags.
              Normally should be set to "global" if your system has the  [1mglob‐[0m
              [1mal[22m(1) command.  If not set, global tags are not used.

       LESSHISTFILE
              Name  of  the  history file used to remember search commands and
              shell commands between invocations of [1mless[22m.  If set  to  "-"  or
              "/dev/null", a history file is not used.  The default depends on
              the operating system, but is usually:

              Linux and Unix
                     "$XDG_STATE_HOME/lesshst" or "$HOME/.local/state/lesshst"
                     or "$XDG_DATA_HOME/lesshst" or "$HOME/.lesshst".

              Windows and MS‐DOS
                     "$HOME/_lesshst".

              OS/2   "$HOME/lesshst.ini" or "$INIT/lesshst.ini".

       LESSHISTSIZE
              The maximum number of commands to save in the history file.  The
              default is 100.

       LESSKEYIN
              Name of the default [4mlesskey[24m [4msource[24m file.

       LESSKEY
              Name   of   the  default  [4mlesskey[24m  [4mbinary[24m  file.  (Not  used  if
              "$LESSKEYIN" exists.)

       LESSKEY_CONTENT
              The value is parsed as if it were the parameter of a  --lesskey‐
              content option.

       LESSKEYIN_SYSTEM
              Name of the default system‐wide [4mlesskey[24m [4msource[24m file.

       LESSKEY_SYSTEM
              Name  of  the default system‐wide [4mlesskey[24m [4mbinary[24m file. (Not used
              if "$LESSKEYIN_SYSTEM" exists.)

       LESSMETACHARS
              List of characters which are considered "metacharacters" by  the
              shell.

       LESSMETAESCAPE
              Prefix  which  less will add before each metacharacter in a com‐
              mand sent to the shell (default "\").

       LESSOPEN
              Command line to invoke the (optional) input‐preprocessor.

       LESSSECURE
              Runs less in "secure" mode.  See discussion under SECURITY.

       LESSSECURE_ALLOW
              Enables individual  features  which  are  normally  disabled  by
              LESSSECURE.  See discussion under SECURITY.

       LESSSEPARATOR
              String to be appended to a directory name in filename completion
              (default "\" on MS‐DOS, Windows, and OS/2; otherwise "/").

       LESSUTFBINFMT
              Format for displaying non‐printable Unicode code points.

       LESSUTFCHARDEF
              Overrides the type of specified Unicode characters.

       LESS_COLUMNS
              Sets the number of columns on the screen.  Unlike COLUMNS, takes
              precedence  over the system’s idea of the screen size, so it can
              be used to make [1mless [22muse less than the full  screen  width.   If
              set  to  a  negative  number, sets the number of columns used to
              this much less than the actual screen width.

       LESS_LINES
              Sets the number of lines on the  screen.   Unlike  LINES,  takes
              precedence  over the system’s idea of the screen size, so it can
              be used to make [1mless [22muse less than the full screen  height.   If
              set  to a negative number, sets the number of lines used to this
              much less than the actual screen height.   When  set,  [1mless  [22mre‐
              paints the entire screen on every movement command, so scrolling
              may be slower.

       LESS_DATA_DELAY
              Duration  (in milliseconds) after starting to read data from the
              input, after which the "Waiting for data" message will  be  dis‐
              played.  The default is 4000 (4 seconds).

       LESS_IS_MORE
              Emulate the [1mmore[22m(1) command.

       LESS_OSC8_xxx
              Where  "xxx"  is  a URI scheme such as "http" or "file", sets an
              OSC 8 handler for opening OSC 8 links containing a URI with that
              scheme.

       LESS_OSC8_ANY
              Sets an OSC 8 handler for opening OSC 8 links for which there is
              no specific LESS_OSC8_xxx handler set for the "xxx" scheme.

       LESS_SHELL_LINES
              When the -F option is set, [1mless [22mexits automatically if the  num‐
              ber  of  screen  lines  used to display the file is less than or
              equal  to  the  screen   height   minus   the   value   of   the
              LESS_SHELL_LINES  variable.   Thus,  if  you  use a shell prompt
              which occupies more than one screen line, this variable  can  be
              set  to  the number of lines used by your prompt, to ensure that
              the entire file can be seen  when  -F  is  used.   If  not  set,
              LESS_SHELL_LINES is assumed to be 1.

       LESS_SIGUSR1
              If set to a string of one or more [1mless [22mcommand characters, those
              commands will be executed when [1mless [22mreceives a SIGUSR1 signal.

       LESS_TERMCAP_xx
              Where  "xx"  is  any two characters, overrides the definition of
              the termcap "xx" capability for the terminal.

       LESS_TERMCAP_BRACKETED_PASTE_START
              Overrides the standard ANSI escape sequence to enable  bracketed
              paste.  This is used when the --no‐paste option is in effect.

       LESS_TERMCAP_BRACKETED_PASTE_END
              Overrides the standard ANSI escape sequence to disable bracketed
              paste.

       LESS_TERMCAP_MOUSE_START
              Overrides  the standard ANSI escape sequence to enable mouse re‐
              porting.  This is used when the --mouse option is in effect.

       LESS_TERMCAP_MOUSE_END
              Overrides the standard ANSI escape sequence to disable mouse re‐
              porting.

       LESS_TERMCAP_SUSPEND
              Defines an escape sequence to  temporarily  suspend  screen  up‐
              dates.  This is sent to the terminal before clearing the screen.
              This  can be used to avoid screen tearing when the screen is re‐
              drawn on certain terminals.

       LESS_TERMCAP_RESUME
              Defines an escape sequence to resume screen  updates.   This  is
              sent to the terminal after displaying the prompt.

       LESS_UNSUPPORT
              A  space‐separated  list of command line options.  These options
              will be ignored (with no error message) if they  appear  on  the
              command line or in the LESS environment variable.  Options list‐
              ed  in  LESS_UNSUPPORT can still be changed by the - and -- com‐
              mands.  Each option in LESS_UNSUPPORT is a dash  followed  by  a
              single character option letter, or two dashes followed by a long
              option name.

       LINES  Sets  the  number of lines on the screen.  Takes precedence over
              the number of lines specified by the TERM variable.  (But if you
              have a windowing system which supports TIOCGWINSZ  or  WIOCGETD,
              the  window  system’s  idea  of the screen size takes precedence
              over the LINES and COLUMNS environment variables.)

       MORE   Options which are passed to [1mless [22mautomatically when  running  in
              [1mmore[22m‐compatible mode.

       PATH   User’s  search path (used to find a lesskey file on MS‐DOS, Win‐
              dows, and OS/2 systems).

       POSIXLY_CORRECT
              If set to any value, all option arguments on  the  command  line
              are expected to appear before any filename arguments.  This must
              be set as an actual environment variable, not in a [1mlesskey [22mfile.

       SHELL  The  shell  used  to execute the ! command, as well as to expand
              filenames.

       TERM   The type of terminal on which [1mless [22mis being run.

       VISUAL The name of the editor (used for the v command).

       XDG_CONFIG_HOME
              Possible location of the [1mlesskey [22mfile; see the KEY BINDINGS sec‐
              tion.

       XDG_DATA_HOME
              Possible location of the history file; see  the  description  of
              the LESSHISTFILE environment variable.

       XDG_STATE_HOME
              Possible  location  of  the history file; see the description of
              the LESSHISTFILE environment variable.

[1mSEE ALSO[0m
       [1mlesskey[22m(1), [1mlessecho[22m(1)

[1mCOPYRIGHT[0m
       Copyright (C) 1984‐2025  Mark Nudelman

       less is part of the GNU project and is free software.  You  can  redis‐
       tribute  it and/or modify it under the terms of either (1) the GNU Gen‐
       eral Public License as published by the Free  Software  Foundation;  or
       (2) the Less License.  See the file README in the less distribution for
       more details regarding redistribution.  You should have received a copy
       of  the  GNU General Public License along with the source for less; see
       the file COPYING.  If not, write to the Free  Software  Foundation,  59
       Temple  Place, Suite 330, Boston, MA  02111‐1307, USA.  You should also
       have received a copy of the Less License; see the file LICENSE.

       less is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but WITHOUT ANY
       WARRANTY; without even the implied warranty of MERCHANTABILITY or  FIT‐
       NESS  FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.  See the GNU General Public License for
       more details.

[1mAUTHOR[0m
       Mark Nudelman
       Report bugs at https://github.com/gwsw/less/issues.
       For more information, see the less homepage at
       https://greenwoodsoftware.com/less.

                           Version 685: 04 Oct 2025                    [4mLESS[24m(1)
