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On my Linux 4.15 machine I found the yes command that appears completely useless - it outputs a string passed as argument (default: 'y') repeatedly untill killed. And... that's it.

name@machine:~$ yes
y
y
[...]
y
y
^C

I have trouble figuring out a possible use case for this, especially given that a simple while true; do echo y; done has similar behavior and is more readable (but I can't find any case for it either).

What can this command be used for? Where does it comes from? Neither the man page nor the full doc answer these questions!

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    If you're running a command or script that is going to prompt you for multiple confirmations, you can pipe yes into it and it automatically answer y without the need for any further interaction on your part. – n8te May 9 '19 at 22:39
7

The command is used to automate scripts of programs where you have a prompt waiting for user input in the form of "press 'y/n' to continue". But there are also other use cases.

See What is the point of the “yes” command?

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