The options are as follows:

-a

Choose from all lists of maxims, both offensive and not. (See the -o option for more information on offensive fortunes.)

-c

Show the cookie file from which the fortune came.

-e

Consider all fortune files to be of equal size (see discussion below on multiple files).

-f

Print out the list of files which would be searched, but don't print a fortune.

-l

Long dictums only. See -n on how ``long'' is defined in this sense.

-m pattern

Print out all fortunes which match the basic regular expression pattern. The syntax of these expressions depends on how your system defines re_comp(3) or regcomp(3), but it should nevertheless be similar to the syntax used in grep(1). The fortunes are output to standard output, while the names of the file from which each fortune comes are printed to standard error. Either or both can be redirected; if standard output is redirected to a file, the result is a valid fortunes database file. If standard error is also redirected to this file, the result is still valid, but there will be ``bogus'' fortunes, i.e. the filenames themselves, in parentheses. This can be useful if you wish to remove the gathered matches from their original files, since each filename-record will precede the records from the file it names.

-n length

Set the longest fortune length (in characters) considered to be ``short'' (the default is 160). All fortunes longer than this are considered ``long''. Be careful! If you set the length too short and ask for short fortunes, or too long and ask for long ones, fortune goes into a never-ending thrash loop.

-o

Choose only from potentially offensive aphorisms. The -o option is ignored if a fortune directory is specified. Please, please, please request a potentially offensive fortune if and only if you believe, deep in your heart, that you are willing to be offended. (And that you'll just quit using -o rather than give us grief about it, okay?) ... let us keep in mind the basic governing philosophy of The Brotherhood, as handsomely summarized in these words: we believe in healthy, hearty laughter -- at the expense of the whole human race, if needs be. Needs be. --H. Allen Smith, "Rude Jokes"

-s

Short apothegms only. See -n on which fortunes are considered ``short''.

-i

Ignore case for -m patterns.

-w

Wait before termination for an amount of time calculated from the number of characters in the message. This is useful if it is executed as part of the logout procedure to guarantee that the message can be read before the screen is cleared.

-u

Don't translate UTF-8 fortunes to the locale when searching or translating.

The user may specify alternate sayings. You can specify a specific file, a directory which contains one or more files, or the special word all which says to use all the standard databases. Any of these may be preceded by a percentage, which is a number n between 0 and 100 inclusive, followed by a %. If it is, there will be a n percent probability that an adage will be picked from that file or directory. If the percentages do not sum to 100, and there are specifications without percentages, the remaining percent will apply to those files and/or directories, in which case the probability of selecting from one of them will be based on their relative sizes.

As an example, given two databases funny and not-funny, with funny twice as big (in number of fortunes, not raw file size), saying fortune funny not-funny will get you fortunes out of funny two-thirds of the time. The command fortune 90% funny 10% not-funny will pick out 90% of its fortunes from funny (the ``10% not-funny'' is unnecessary, since 10% is all that's left).

The -e option says to consider all files equal; thus fortune -e funny not-funny is equivalent to fortune 50% funny 50% not-funny This fortune also supports the BSD method of appending ``-o'' to database names to specify offensive fortunes. However this is not how fortune stores them: offensive fortunes are stored in a seperate directory without the ``-o'' infix. A plain name (i.e., not a path to a file or directory) that ends in ``-o'' will be assumed to be an offensive database, and will have its suffix stripped off and be searched in the offensive directory (even if the neither of the -a or -o options were specified). This feature is not only for backwards-compatibility, but also to allow users to distinguish between inoffensive and offensive databases of the same name.

For example, assuming there is a database named definitions in both the inoffensive and potentially offensive collections, then the following command will select an inoffensive definition 90% of the time, and a potentially offensive definition for the remaining 10%: fortune 90% definitions definitions-o