jq has quite a few more ways to input things more than from stdin and files. Some examples: $ abc=123 jq -cn '$ENV | {abc, othername: .abc}' {"abc":"123","

jq has quite a few more ways to input things more than from stdin and files. Some examples: $ abc=123 jq -cn '$ENV | {abc, othername: .abc}' {"abc":"123","othername":"123"} $ jq -cn --arg abc 123 '{$abc, othername: $abc}' {"abc":"123","othername":"123"} $ jq -cn --argjson abc 123 '{$abc, othername: $abc}' {"abc":123,"othername":123}