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TLDR

The tldr command provides a collaborative cheat sheet for console commands. It's designed to give you exactly what you need: common usage examples for popular CLI tools (like git, tar, docker) without having to read through lengthy man pages.

It pulls data from the global tldr-pages project, offering interactive navigation and support for multiple operating systems and languages.

Syntax

The tldr command can be used in two ways:

Slash Command:

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/tldr command:STRING [platform:STRING] [language:STRING] [show_short:BOOLEAN] [show_long:BOOLEAN] [show_both:BOOLEAN]

Prefix Command:

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$tldr <command> [-platform PLATFORM] [-language LANG] [-short] [-long] [-both]
$tldr <command> [-p PLATFORM] [-lang LANG] [-l LANG] [-short] [-long] [-both]
$man <command> [-platform PLATFORM] [-language LANG] [-short] [-long] [-both]
$man <command> [-p PLATFORM] [-lang LANG] [-l LANG] [-short] [-long] [-both]

Aliases:

You can also use these aliases instead of tldr:

  • man

Parameters

Parameter Type Required Description
command STRING Yes The CLI command to look up (e.g., tar, grep, git-commit). Use hyphens for multi-word commands.
platform STRING No OS platform (e.g., linux, osx, windows, common, android, freebsd).
language STRING No Language code (e.g., en, es, fr, de, pt, zh, ja).
show_short BOOLEAN No Display short-form options only.
show_long BOOLEAN No Display long-form options only (default).
show_both BOOLEAN No Display both short and long options.

Flags (Prefix Command)

This command supports the following flags:

Flag Aliases Type Default Description
-platform -p String None Specify a preferred OS platform (e.g., linux, osx, windows, common).
-language -lang, -l String None Choose a specific language code (e.g., en, es, fr).
-show_short -short Boolean False Display short-form options only.
-show_long -long Boolean True Display long-form options only (default).
-show_both -both Boolean False Show both short and long options.

Usage Examples

Quick Reference

Get the most common usage examples for a command.

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/tldr command:tar
/tldr command:grep

Multi-Word Commands

Look up commands with multiple words using hyphens.

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/tldr command:git-commit
/tldr command:git-status
/tldr command:docker-compose

Platform Specific

Look up platform-specific examples for a command.

Text Only
/tldr command:git platform:linux
/tldr command:tar platform:osx
/tldr command:dir platform:windows

Multilingual Support

View documentation in different languages.

Text Only
/tldr command:ls language:es
/tldr command:grep language:fr
/tldr command:tar language:de

Display Options

Control how options are displayed (short-form, long-form, or both).

Text Only
/tldr command:tar show_short:true
/tldr command:git show_both:true

Response Format

The bot returns an embed with the command's description and a list of common usage examples.

  • Command description - Brief explanation of what the command does
  • Usage examples - Common use cases with explanations, formatted in code blocks for easy copying
  • Interactive pagination - If the content spans multiple pages, use the navigation buttons at the bottom to browse through all examples
  • Platform indicator - Shows which platform the examples are for (if specified)
  • Language indicator - Shows which language the page is in (if not English)

All examples are formatted in code blocks, making them ready to copy and paste directly into your terminal.

Behavior Notes

  • Command normalization: Multi-word commands are automatically normalized (e.g., git commit becomes git-commit)
  • Autocomplete: The slash command provides autocomplete suggestions for commands, platforms, and languages
  • Caching: TLDR pages are cached locally for faster access
  • Platform fallback: If a platform-specific page isn't found, the bot falls back to the common platform
  • Language fallback: If a language-specific page isn't available, the bot falls back to English
  • /wiki arch - For deep technical documentation on Linux tools
  • /wiki - For general knowledge search