Lightweight CLI tool for instantly explaining command-line flags without digging through man pages
whattheflag helps you understand command-line flags and options for many popular CLI tools directly in your terminal.
Simply prepend whattheflag to a command to see what its flags mean.
Features
- Explain command-line flags for many popular CLI tools
- Understand copied shell commands by translating their flags
- Expand combined short flags (e.g.
-fsSL) - Show both short and long flag versions when available
- Display explanations in a clean table format
- Show all known flags for a specific tool
Installation
pip install whattheflag
Usage
All functionality is available through the command line interface.
You can:
- Search for a specific tool (
whattheflag df) - Search for a specific flag or option (
whattheflag curl -fsSL --help) - Display an overview of all available options (
whattheflag tools)
Example Commands
Overview for a Tool
Shows all available flags and options for a tool.
whattheflag df
| Flag | Long | Description |
|---|---|---|
| -a | --all | Include dummy filesystems |
| -B | --block_size | Specify block size |
| -h | --human_readable | Print sizes in human readable format |
| -i | --inodes | List inode information |
| --total | Produce grand total | |
| -T | --type | Print filesystem type |
Explanation for a Specific Flag
Shows the meaning of the provided flags.
whattheflag curl -fsSL --help
| Flag | Long | Description |
|---|---|---|
| -f | --fail | Fail silently on HTTP errors |
| -s | --silent | Silent mode, do not show progress |
| -S | --show-error | Show error even when using silent mode |
| -L | --location | Follow HTTP redirects |
| -h | --help | Show help for curl |
List Supported Tools
Lists all supported tools.
whattheflag tools
Supported Tools
| awk | curl | df | docker |
| du | find | git | grep |
| gzip | jq | kubectl | nc |
| ps | rsync | sed | ssh |
| tar | top | unzip | wget |
| xargs | yq | zip |
1 maintainer
Metadata
1 maintainer
Release files for whattheflag 0.1.2
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Source distribution (sdist)
| File | Size | Uploaded | Provenance | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| whattheflag-0.1.2.tar.gz | 10.3 kB | Without provenance | Details |
Built distribution (wheel)
| File | Interpreter | ABI | Platform | Reset |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| whattheflag-0.1.2-py3-none-any.whl | Python 3 | none | any | Details |
Total release size: 28.7 kB
Release files / whattheflag-0.1.2.tar.gz
| Download URL | whattheflag-0.1.2.tar.gz |
|---|---|
| Size | 10.3 kB |
| Tags | Source |
|
SHA-256 checksum How to use checksums |
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|
Release files / whattheflag-0.1.2-py3-none-any.whl
| Download URL | whattheflag-0.1.2-py3-none-any.whl |
|---|---|
| Size | 18.3 kB |
| Tags | Python 3 |
|
SHA-256 checksum How to use checksums |
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Yes |
| Uploaded via |
uv/0.10.8 {"installer":{"name":"uv","version":"0.10.8","subcommand":["publish"]},"python":null,"implementation":{"name":null,"version":null},"distro":{"name":"Ubuntu","version":"24.04","id":"noble","libc":null},"system":{"name":null,"release":null},"cpu":null,"openssl_version":null,"setuptools_version":null,"rustc_version":null,"ci":true}
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Security for whattheflag 0.1.2
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None of the files in this release were uploaded with provenance metadata.
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