# Strings command

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<figure><img src="/files/BNE8cjVABP1Cey7F51oM" alt=""><figcaption></figcaption></figure>

The command:

```
strings -e {s,S,b,l,B,L} file
```

e flag controls the character encoding (size + endianness) — Each option defines the characters size and endianness of the bytes.

| **Flag Value** | **Character Size** | **Common Use Case**                                   |
| -------------- | ------------------ | ----------------------------------------------------- |
| `s`            | 7-bit (1 byte)     | Very old legacy systems (ASCII).                      |
| `S`            | 8-bit (1 byte)     | Standard text and most Linux files. (Default) (UTF-8) |
| `b` or `l`     | 16-bit (2 bytes)   | Windows files (UTF-16) and many Java/C# applications. |
| `B` or `L`     | 32-bit (4 bytes)   | Wide-character sets (UTF-32).                         |


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