ForHosting KIT · Developer Utilities

Shell argument quoter

This shell argument quoter converts plain text into a form that is safe to paste as a single POSIX shell argument, and it reverses the same mapping when you need the original string back from quoted shell syntax.

● BetaFree · in your browser

Run — free How it works & API

Use it from WebAPIEmailTelegramApp soon

Encoding follows the familiar single-quote convention used by tools like shlex.quote: empty input becomes a pair of empty single quotes, tokens made only of letters digits and a small set of safe punctuation stay bare, and everything else is wrapped in single quotes with each embedded apostrophe rewritten as end-quote, escaped-quote, re-open-quote so the shell never sees an unclosed string. Decoding walks one argv word through single quotes, double quotes with the limited POSIX escape set, and unquoted backslash escapes, and it fails loudly on unterminated quotes, a trailing backslash, or unquoted whitespace so a half-copied command fragment never silently becomes the wrong path. The path is fully deterministic: the same text and mode always produce the same result, with no network calls, no random salts, and no date-dependent shortcuts. Small checks include quoting a path with spaces into single quotes, embedding an apostrophe inside a quoted word, and rejecting a double-quoted fragment that never closes. Use it free in the browser for script hygiene and fixture cleanup, or call the API at $0.002 per successful request when pipelines need reproducible shell quoting in CI and backend services.

How to use it

Enter your values in the form above. The tool checks them before calculating and shows the result on the same page.

Check your inputs

Use the labels and units shown next to each field. If something is missing or outside the allowed range, the page points to the field to fix.

Use it again or automate it

Use the browser tool for individual checks and the API when you need the same capability in an automated workflow.

What you can do with it

Get an answer now

Enter one set of values and see the result without building a spreadsheet or script.

Compare scenarios

Change one value at a time and rerun the calculation to understand what affects the result.

Automate repeated work

Use the API when the same calculation needs to run inside your product or workflow.

FAQ

How do I use this capability?

Complete the fields above and run it on this page. The form highlights anything that needs attention.

For developers — API access

Everything on this page is available programmatically. This section is for teams who want to wire it into their own systems; everyone else can just use the tool above.

API endpoint

POSThttps://api.kit.forhosting.com/enc/shell-escape

Prefer to automate it? One authenticated POST creates the task; the result comes back by webhook or a signed link. The same capability also runs here on the web, by email and from Telegram — and soon from our app too.

Call it from your stack

curl -X POST https://api.kit.forhosting.com/enc/shell-escape \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $KIT_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"text":"hello world"}'

const res = await fetch("https://api.kit.forhosting.com/enc/shell-escape", {
  method: "POST",
  headers: {
    "Authorization": `Bearer ${process.env.KIT_KEY}`,
    "Content-Type": "application/json"
  },
  body: JSON.stringify({
    "text": "hello world"
  })
});
const { task_id } = await res.json();

import os, requests

res = requests.post(
    "https://api.kit.forhosting.com/enc/shell-escape",
    headers={"Authorization": f"Bearer {os.environ['KIT_KEY']}"},
    json={
    "text": "hello world"
},
)
task_id = res.json()["task_id"]

<?php
$res = file_get_contents("https://api.kit.forhosting.com/enc/shell-escape", false, stream_context_create([
  "http" => [
    "method"  => "POST",
    "header"  => "Authorization: Bearer " . getenv("KIT_KEY") . "\r\nContent-Type: application/json",
    "content" => '{"text":"hello world"}',
  ],
]));
$task = json_decode($res, true);

body := bytes.NewBufferString(`{"text":"hello world"}`)
req, _ := http.NewRequest("POST", "https://api.kit.forhosting.com/enc/shell-escape", body)
req.Header.Set("Authorization", "Bearer "+os.Getenv("KIT_KEY"))
req.Header.Set("Content-Type", "application/json")
res, _ := http.DefaultClient.Do(req)

Example request

{
  "text": "hello world"
}

Example response

{
  "task_id": "tsk_a1b2c3d4e5f6a1b2c3d4e5f6",
  "type": "enc.shell_escape",
  "status": "queued",
  "_links": {
    "result": "/tasks/tsk_…/result"
  }
}

The API is asynchronous: the call returns a task_id immediately and the result arrives by webhook. Polling is capped at 1 req/s per task.

Pricing

Per request$0.002

Published price — no tokens, no invented credits. A failed task is never charged.

Errors

HTTP	Code	Meaning
`401`	`unauthorized`	Missing or invalid API key.
`402`	`insufficient_balance`	Your balance doesn't cover the task price.
`404`	`unknown_type`	That task type doesn't exist.
`429`	`rate_limited`	Too many requests. Use the webhook instead of polling.

Read the full KIT documentation →