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.\"-
.\" Copyright (c) 1990, 1993
.\" The Regents of the University of California. All rights reserved.
.\" Copyright (c) 2026 Project Tick. All rights reserved.
.\"
.\" This code is derived from software contributed to Berkeley by
.\" the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc.
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.\" modification, are permitted provided that the following conditions
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.\" notice, this list of conditions and the following disclaimer.
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.\"
.Dd Februrary 6, 2026
.Dt PWD 1
.Os
.Sh NAME
.Nm pwd
.Nd return working directory name
.Sh SYNOPSIS
.Nm
.Op Fl L | P
.Sh DESCRIPTION
The
.Nm
utility writes the absolute pathname of the current working directory to
the standard output.
.Pp
Some shells may provide a builtin
.Nm
command which is similar or identical to this utility.
Consult the
.Xr builtin 1
manual page.
.Pp
The options are as follows:
.Bl -tag -width indent
.It Fl L
Display the logical current working directory.
If the
.Ev PWD
environment variable is set to an absolute path with no
.Ql \&.
or
.Ql \&..
components, and
.Xr stat 2
confirms it refers to the same inode as
.Ql \&. ,
then
.Ev PWD
is printed as-is.
Otherwise the physical path is used as a fallback.
.It Fl P
Display the physical current working directory (all symbolic links
resolved).
The path is obtained via
.Xr getcwd 3 .
.El
.Pp
If no options are specified, the
.Fl L
option is assumed.
.Sh ENVIRONMENT
Environment variables used by
.Nm :
.Bl -tag -width ".Ev PWD"
.It Ev PWD
Logical current working directory.
Used only when
.Fl L
is in effect (the default).
.El
.Sh EXIT STATUS
.Ex -std
.Pp
A non-zero exit status is returned when
.Xr getcwd 3
fails (e.g.\& the current directory has been deleted or permissions
deny traversal) or when writing to standard output fails.
.Sh EXAMPLES
Show current working directory with symbolic links resolved:
.Bd -literal -offset indent
$ /bin/pwd -P
/usr/src/sys/kern
.Ed
.Pp
Show the logical current directory when inside a symlink:
.Bd -literal -offset indent
$ mkdir -p real/sub
$ ln -s real link
$ cd link/sub
$ /bin/pwd -L
/home/user/link/sub
$ /bin/pwd -P
/home/user/real/sub
.Ed
.Sh SEE ALSO
.Xr cd 1 ,
.Xr realpath 1 ,
.Xr sh 1 ,
.Xr stat 2 ,
.Xr getcwd 3
.Sh STANDARDS
The
.Nm
utility conforms to
.St -p1003.1-2001 .
.Sh HISTORY
The
.Nm
command appeared in
.At v5 .
.Sh BUGS
In interactive shells the builtin
.Nm
command is always faster and maintains a logical path stack.
However, it can give a different answer in the rare case that the
current directory or a containing directory was moved after the shell
descended into it.
.Pp
The
.Fl L
option does not work unless the
.Ev PWD
environment variable is exported by the shell.
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