[e12e]

It's a little sad that standard shell here documents only support elliding leading tabs (it wouldn't be so sad if the record separator hadn't been thrown under the bus - having a character for indentation distinct from space is good... In theory).

But at any rate my typical usage() is generally along these lines (warning watch out for expansions):

  usage()
  {
    cat - <<-EOF
    `basename ${0}`: demonstrate here docs
     Usage:
     `basename ${0}` <required argument> [-o|--optional-param] 

       Etc. Possibly referencing
       default value: ${DEFAULT_VALUE}
    EOF
  }

[jolmg]

I think it'd be better without using basename, just $0. That way it matches the way it was called, which is how the user chose to access it for whatever reason. The bare filename might refer to a different command, even. Also, if you include examples in the help text, they'll also be able to copy and paste, instead of having to manually insert what basename stripped away.

[e12e]

True enough - I find it depends a bit on the nature of the script - if it's something buried under misc/tools/extra/bin/util.sh - i tend to prefer brevity - especially in the first paragraph/usage section (util.sh <required param> [optional param]).

But for more concrete examples I'll often leave off the basename - for easier cut and paste.