CAT

Section: User Commands (1)
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BSD mandoc
BSD 3  

NAME

cat - concatenate and print files  

SYNOPSIS

[-benstuv ] [- ] [file ... ]  

DESCRIPTION

The utility reads files sequentially, writing them to the standard output. The file operands are processed in command line order. A single dash represents the standard input.

The options are as follows:

-b
Implies the -n option but doesn't number blank lines.
-e
Implies the -v option, and displays a dollar sign (`$' ) at the end of each line as well.
-n
Number the output lines, starting at 1.
-s
Squeeze multiple adjacent empty lines, causing the output to be single spaced.
-t
Implies the -v option, and displays tab characters as `^I' as well.
-u
The -u option guarantees that the output is unbuffered.
-v
Displays non-printing characters so they are visible. Control characters print as `^X' for control-X; the delete character (octal 0177) prints as `^?' Non-ascii characters (with the high bit set) are printed as `M-' (for meta) followed by the character for the low 7 bits.

The utility exits 0 on success, and >0 if an error occurs.  

BUGS

Because of the shell language mechanism used to perform output redirection, the command ``cat file1 file2 > file1 '' will cause the original data in file1 to be destroyed!  

SEE ALSO

head(1), more(1), pr(1), tail(1), vis(1)
Rob Pike "UNIX Style, or cat -v Considered Harmful" "USENIX Summer Conference Proceedings" 1983
 

HISTORY

A utility appeared in AT&T System v6 .


 

Index

NAME
SYNOPSIS
DESCRIPTION
BUGS
SEE ALSO
HISTORY

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Time: 04:29:43 GMT, April 24, 2025