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  • Somehow, this question sat here for a couple of years, without an accurate answer. I just discovered the solution (answered separately here) and now I see you've posted almost the exact same answer only a few minutes before me. If only you'd posted this before, it would have saved me figuring it out on my own! Commented Jan 21, 2021 at 16:52
  • @jrw32982 I don't think I saw this question before, but Charles just edited their answer which bumped the question to the top of the home page, where I spotted it. Commented Jan 21, 2021 at 16:54
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    Yes, that's the only approach so far that handles arbitrary values. jq even happens to support non-text values in its strings as an extension over standard json. It seems to be using the safest form of quoting ('...'). I note that it transforms a NUL byte to \0 and doesn't quote numbers nor false/true though that should be fine. As usual, note that it may transform numbers (like change 1e2 to 100 or infinity to 1.7976931348623157e+308). Commented Jan 21, 2021 at 17:01
  • @StéphaneChazelas Do you think it's an issue that some values are left unquoted? If so, one could pass the data through tostring before letting @sh format them. Commented Jan 21, 2021 at 17:06
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    I don't expect it would here. There are context where not quoting numbers can be an issue (like in echo '2'>file vs echo 2>file), but no here I'd say. Commented Jan 21, 2021 at 17:10