$ Linux Command

Files

tempfile

Create a temporary file safely.

temptemporaryfilecreatesafe

Additional Notes

tempfile creates a temporary file with a unique name in a secure way. The generated filename is printed to standard output so it can be captured by a script. It avoids race conditions and symlink attacks that can occur when using naive methods like mktemp with user-generated names.

The file is created in $TMPDIR if set, or in /tmp by default. On Debian-based systems it is provided by the debianutils package. Many modern scripts prefer mktemp which is more portable across Linux distributions.

Syntax

tempfile [options]

Parameters

No positional parameters. The temporary file path is returned on stdout.

Common Options

  • -d, --directory: Create a temporary directory instead of a file.
  • -p string, --prefix string: Use string as the prefix for the filename (defaults to tmp).
  • -s string, --suffix string: Use string as the suffix for the filename.
  • -m mode, --mode mode: Set the file permission mode (e.g. 0600).
  • --help: Display help and exit.

Examples

tempfile

Create a temporary file. Output: /tmp/tmp.XXXXXX

TMPFILE=$(tempfile)
echo "Log data" > "$TMPFILE"
rm "$TMPFILE"

Create a temp file, write to it, then remove it.

tempfile -p backup- -s .txt

Create a temp file with a custom prefix and suffix.

Practical Notes

  • tempfile is less portable than mktemp. Use mktemp for scripts that should work across BSD, macOS, and other Unix-like systems.
  • Always clean up temporary files in scripts, ideally with a trap handler.
  • Use trap 'rm -f "$TMPFILE"' EXIT to ensure cleanup on script exit.