The "File Header" section of Google's Shell Style Guide is one way to add a 'docstring' to your bash scripts.

Basically, the answer is to use #, rather than quotes like you would with Python.

You can do this for Bash easily, it is a little more tricky if you need to ensure compatibility with POSIX only shells like /bin/sh or primarily busybox systems like Alpine.

The Linux Documentation Project has some great examples.

http://tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/here-docs.html

Yet another twist of this nifty trick makes "self-documenting" scripts possible.

Example 19-12. A self-documenting script

#!/bin/bash # self-document.sh: self-documenting script # Modification of "colm.sh". DOC_REQUEST=70 if [ "$1" = "-h" -o "$1" = "--help" ] # Request help. then echo; echo "Usage: $0 [directory-name]"; echo sed --silent -e '/DOCUMENTATIONXX$/,/^DOCUMENTATIONXX$/p' "$0" | sed -e '/DOCUMENTATIONXX$/d'; exit $DOC_REQUEST; fi : <<DOCUMENTATIONXX List the statistics of a specified directory in tabular format. --------------------------------------------------------------- The command-line parameter gives the directory to be listed. If no directory specified or directory specified cannot be read, then list the current working directory. DOCUMENTATIONXX if [ -z "$1" -o ! -r "$1" ] then directory=. else directory="$1" fi echo "Listing of "$directory":"; echo (printf "PERMISSIONS LINKS OWNER GROUP SIZE MONTH DAY HH:MM PROG-NAME\n" \ ; ls -l "$directory" | sed 1d) | column -t exit 0 

Using a cat script is an alternate way of accomplishing this.

DOC_REQUEST=70 if [ "$1" = "-h" -o "$1" = "--help" ] # Request help. then # Use a "cat script" . . . cat <<DOCUMENTATIONXX List the statistics of a specified directory in tabular format. --------------------------------------------------------------- The command-line parameter gives the directory to be listed. If no directory specified or directory specified cannot be read, then list the current working directory. DOCUMENTATIONXX exit $DOC_REQUEST fi 

A slightly more elegant example using functions to handle the documentation and error messages.

#!/bin/sh usage() { cat << EOF Usage: $0 [-u [username]] [-p] Options: -u <username> : Optionally specify the new username to set password for. -p : Prompt for a new password. EOF } die() { echo echo "$1, so giving up. Sorry." echo exit 2 } if [ -z "$USER" ] ; then die "Could not identify the existing user" fi if $PSET ; then passwd $USER || die "Busybox didn't like your password" fi 

https://github.com/jyellick/mficli/blob/master/util/changecreds.sh

You can use the : (null) built-in for bash functions loaded into your environment from a .bashrc-style include.

$ declare -f my_function my_function() { : My function does this and that echo "foo" } $ my_function foo $ type my_function my_function is a function my_function () { : My function does this and that; echo "foo" } 

I proposed a method for how to do bash docstrings in a blog post.

In short, use a non-executing function __docstring__(), and write a help commands that find all of these to print a help screen.

build() { __docstring__() { echo """<params> Build and work on stuff -j <core> - number of cores """ } : # << your build implementation here >> }