ANNOTATE Command

HSI Version:

2.4

Purpose:

Adds annotation text to existing files or directories.

Aliases:  

Command Format: 

anno[tate] [-R] [-e] [-d] [-f] [-A "string"] path ...

Options:

-A : annotation string (including metacharacters). An empty string is treated as if the -e option was specified

-R : recursively traverse directories in the specified path(s)

-e : erase any existing annotation

-d : operate only on directory objects

-f : operate only on file objects

Keywords:

 

Usage Notes:

  1. The annotation string may be a maximum of 255 characters. It is silently truncated during expansion if it exceeds this length.
  2. The annotation string may contain backslash-escaped characters which are replaced with their normal ASCII equivalents as follows:
    • \a alert -> bell character
    • \n newline
    • \f formfeed
    • \r carriage return
    • \t horizontal tab
    • \v vertical tab
    • \\ backslash
    • \? question mark
    • \' single quote
    • \" double quote
    Note that 2 consecutive backslash characters are required in order to enter one of the above, since the HSI parser treats the first backslash as a "quote" character while initially scanning the command. The second backslash and the character following are then evaluated by the code that the annotate command.

Example:

Add annotation to the file "test.results" and then list the annotation 

annotate -A "Results of test \\nRun on 09/01/2001" test.results
ls -A test.results

Remove annotation from all directory objects in the directory tree "old.experiment" 

annotate -eRd old.experiment

Related Command(s):

LS (-A option)
MKDIR (-A option)
PUT (-A option)