Hi bakunin,
It will with a recent ksh (such as version 93u+). It might with a recent bash, but not with bash version 3.26 (the version included with the latest macOS release) where the following command:

Code:

read x?'Prompt: '

prints no prompt, blocks waiting to read a response, and after a response has been entered gives the diagnostic:

Code:

bash: read: `x?Prompt: ': not a valid identifier

Other shells might do what you want, might print a diagnostic without waiting for input, or might behave in a manner similar to that shown above.

I tend to use an echo or printf to print the prompt before the read, so I get the desired results with any version of any shell that is based on Bourne shell syntax (since the mid 1970's when using echo or since the late 1980's when using printf). But, if you know you only want to run your script on a system where the shell you're using has a built-in read utility with prompting, by all means take advantage of the shortcut.