ASCIIDOCTOR(1) Asciidoctor Manual ASCIIDOCTOR(1)
NAME
asciidoctor - converts AsciiDoc source files to HTML, DocBook, and other
formats
SYNOPSIS
asciidoctor [OPTION]... FILE...
DESCRIPTION
The asciidoctor(1) command converts the AsciiDoc source file(s) FILE to
HTML5, DocBook 5, man(ual) page, and other custom output formats.
If FILE is - then the AsciiDoc source is read from standard input.
OPTIONS
Security Settings
-B, --base-dir=DIR
Base directory containing the document and resources. Defaults to
the directory containing the source file or, if the source is read
from a stream, the working directory. When combined with the safe
mode setting, can be used to chroot the execution of the program.
-S, --safe-mode=SAFE_MODE
Set safe mode level: unsafe, safe, server, or secure. Disables
potentially dangerous macros in source files, such as include::[].
If not set, the safe mode level defaults to unsafe when Asciidoctor
is invoked using this script.
--safe
Set safe mode level to safe. Enables include directives, but
prevents access to ancestor paths of source file. Provided for
compatibility with the asciidoc command. If not set, the safe mode
level defaults to unsafe when Asciidoctor is invoked using this
script.
Document Settings
-a, --attribute=ATTRIBUTE
Define, override, or unset a document attribute. Command-line
attributes take precedence over attributes defined in the source
file unless either the name or value ends in @. No substitutions are
applied to the value.
ATTRIBUTE is normally formatted as a key-value pair, in the form
NAME=VALUE. Alternate forms are NAME (where the VALUE defaults to an
empty string), NAME! (unsets the NAME attribute), and NAME=VALUE@
(or NAME@=VALUE) (where VALUE does not override the NAME attribute
if it’s already defined in the source document). A value containing
spaces must be enclosed in quotes, in the form NAME="VALUE WITH
SPACES".
This option may be specified more than once.
-b, --backend=BACKEND
Backend output file format: html5, docbook5, and manpage are
supported out of the box. You can also use the backend alias names
html (aliased to html5) or docbook (aliased to docbook5). Other
values can be passed, but if Asciidoctor cannot resolve the backend
to a converter, it will fail. Defaults to html5.
-d, --doctype=DOCTYPE
Document type: article, book, manpage, or inline. Sets the root
element when using the docbook backend and the style class on the
HTML body element when using the html backend. The book document
type allows multiple level-0 section titles in a single document.
The manpage document type enables parsing of metadata necessary to
produce a man page. The inline document type allows the content of a
single paragraph to be formatted and returned without wrapping it in
a containing element. Defaults to article.
Document Conversion
-D, --destination-dir=DIR
Destination output directory. Defaults to the directory containing
the source file or, if the source is read from a stream, the working
directory. If specified, the directory is resolved relative to the
working directory.
-E, --template-engine=NAME
Template engine to use for the custom converter templates. The gem
with the same name as the engine will be loaded automatically. This
name is also used to build the full path to the custom converter
templates. If a template engine is not specified, it will be
auto-detected based on the file extension of the custom converter
templates found.
-e, --embedded
Output an embeddable document, which excludes the header, the
footer, and everything outside the body of the document. This option
is useful for producing documents that can be inserted into an
external template.
-I, --load-path=DIRECTORY
Add the specified directory to the load path, so that -r can load
extensions from outside the default Ruby load path. This option may
be specified more than once.
-n, --section-numbers
Auto-number section titles. Synonym for --attribute sectnums.
-o, --out-file=OUT_FILE
Write output to file OUT_FILE. Defaults to the base name of the
input file suffixed with backend extension. The file is resolved
relative to the working directory. If the input is read from
standard input or a named pipe (fifo), then the output file defaults
to stdout. If OUT_FILE is -, then the output file is written to
standard output.
-R, --source-dir=DIR
Source directory. Currently only used if the destination directory
is also specified. Used to preserve the directory structure of files
converted within this directory in the destination directory. If
specified, the directory is resolved relative to the working
directory.
-r, --require=LIBRARY
Require the specified library before executing the processor, using
the standard Ruby require. This option may be specified more than
once.
-s, --no-header-footer
Output an embeddable document, which excludes the header, the
footer, and everything outside the body of the document. This option
is useful for producing documents that can be inserted into an
external template.
-T, --template-dir=DIR
A directory containing custom converter templates that override one
or more templates from the built-in set. (requires tilt gem)
If there is a subfolder that matches the engine name (if specified),
that folder is appended to the template directory path. Similarly,
if there is a subfolder in the resulting template directory that
matches the name of the backend, that folder is appended to the
template directory path.
This option may be specified more than once. Matching templates
found in subsequent directories override ones previously discovered.
Processing Information
--failure-level=LEVEL
Set the minimum logging level (default: FATAL) that yields a
non-zero exit code (i.e., failure). If this option is not set, the
program exits with a zero exit code even if warnings or errors have
been logged.
-q, --quiet
Silence application log messages and script warnings.
--trace
Include backtrace information when reporting errors.
-v, --verbose
Sets log level to DEBUG so application messages logged at INFO or
DEBUG level are printed to stderr.
-w, --warnings
Turn on script warnings (applies to executed code).
-t, --timings
Print timings report to stderr (time to read, parse, and convert).
Program Information
-h, --help [TOPIC]
Print a help message. Show the command usage if TOPIC is not
specified or recognized. Dump the Asciidoctor man page (in
troff/groff format) if TOPIC is manpage. Print an AsciiDoc syntax
crib sheet (in AsciiDoc) if TOPIC is syntax.
-V, --version
Print program version number.
-v can also be used if no source files are specified.
ENVIRONMENT
Asciidoctor honors the SOURCE_DATE_EPOCH environment variable. If this
variable is assigned an integer value, that value is used as the epoch
of all input documents and as the local date and time. See
https://reproducible-builds.org/specs/source-date-epoch/ for more
information about this environment variable.
EXIT STATUS
0
Success.
1
Failure (syntax or usage error; configuration error; document
processing failure; unexpected error).
BUGS
Refer to the Asciidoctor issue tracker at
https://github.com/asciidoctor/asciidoctor/issues?q=is%3Aopen.
AUTHORS
Asciidoctor is led and maintained by Dan Allen and Sarah White and has
received contributions from many individuals in the Asciidoctor
community. The project was started in 2012 by Ryan Waldron based on a
prototype written by Nick Hengeveld for the Git website. Jason Porter
wrote the first implementation of the CLI interface provided by this
command.
AsciiDoc.py was created by Stuart Rackham and has received contributions
from many individuals in the AsciiDoc.py community.
RESOURCES
Project website: https://asciidoctor.org
Project documentation: https://docs.asciidoctor.org
Community chat: https://chat.asciidoctor.org
Source repository: https://github.com/asciidoctor/asciidoctor
Mailing list archive: https://discuss.asciidoctor.org
COPYING
Copyright (C) 2012-present Dan Allen, Sarah White, Ryan Waldron, and the
individual contributors to Asciidoctor. Use of this software is granted
under the terms of the MIT License.
Asciidoctor 2.0.23 2018-03-20 ASCIIDOCTOR(1)
Generated by dwww version 1.16 on Tue Dec 16 06:05:52 CET 2025.