paste(1p) - phpMan

PASTE(1P)                  POSIX Programmer's Manual                 PASTE(1P)

PROLOG
       This  manual  page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual.  The Linux
       implementation of this interface may differ (consult the  corresponding
       Linux  manual page for details of Linux behavior), or the interface may
       not be implemented on Linux.
NAME
       paste - merge corresponding or subsequent lines of files
SYNOPSIS
       paste [-s][-d list] file...
DESCRIPTION
       The paste utility shall concatenate  the  corresponding  lines  of  the
       given input files, and write the resulting lines to standard output.
       The  default  operation  of  paste  shall concatenate the corresponding
       lines of the input files. The <newline> of every line except  the  line
       from the last input file shall be replaced with a <tab>.
       If an end-of-file condition is detected on one or more input files, but
       not all input files, paste shall behave as though empty lines were read
       from  the files on which end-of-file was detected, unless the -s option
       is specified.
OPTIONS
       The paste utility shall conform  to  the  Base  Definitions  volume  of
       IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, Section 12.2, Utility Syntax Guidelines.
       The following options shall be supported:
       -d  list
              Unless  a backslash character appears in list, each character in
              list is an element specifying a delimiter character. If a  back-
              slash character appears in list, the backslash character and one
              or more characters following it  are  an  element  specifying  a
              delimiter  character  as described below. These elements specify
              one or more delimiters to use, instead of the default <tab>,  to
              replace  the  <newline> of the input lines. The elements in list
              shall be used circularly; that is, when the  list  is  exhausted
              the first element from the list is reused. When the -s option is
              specified:
               * The last <newline> in a file shall not be modified.
               * The delimiter shall be reset to the  first  element  of  list
                 after each file operand is processed.
       When the -s option is not specified:
               * The <newline>s in the file specified by the last file operand
                 shall not be modified.
               * The delimiter shall be reset to the  first  element  of  list
                 each time a line is processed from each file.
       If  a backslash character appears in list, it and the character follow-
       ing it shall be used to represent the following delimiter characters:
       \n
              <newline>.
       \t
              <tab>.
       \\
              Backslash character.
       \0
              Empty string (not a null character). If '\0' is immediately fol-
              lowed  by the character 'x', the character 'X', or any character
              defined by the LC_CTYPE digit keyword (see the Base  Definitions
              volume  of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001, Chapter 7, Locale), the results
              are unspecified.

       If any other characters follow the backslash, the results are  unspeci-
       fied.
       -s     Concatenate all of the lines of each separate input file in com-
              mand line order. The <newline> of every  line  except  the  last
              line in each input file shall be replaced with the <tab>, unless
              otherwise specified by the -d option.

OPERANDS
       The following operand shall be supported:
       file   A pathname of an input file. If '-' is specified for one or more
              of  the  files,  the  standard input shall be used; the standard
              input shall be read one line at a  time,  circularly,  for  each
              instance  of  '-'  . Implementations shall support pasting of at
              least 12 file operands.

STDIN
       The standard input shall be used only if one or more file  operands  is
       '-' . See the INPUT FILES section.
INPUT FILES
       The  input files shall be text files, except that line lengths shall be
       unlimited.
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
       The following environment  variables  shall  affect  the  execution  of
       paste:
       LANG   Provide  a  default value for the internationalization variables
              that are unset or null. (See  the  Base  Definitions  volume  of
              IEEE Std 1003.1-2001,  Section  8.2,  Internationalization Vari-
              ables for the precedence of internationalization variables  used
              to determine the values of locale categories.)
       LC_ALL If  set  to a non-empty string value, override the values of all
              the other internationalization variables.
       LC_CTYPE
              Determine the locale for  the  interpretation  of  sequences  of
              bytes  of  text  data as characters (for example, single-byte as
              opposed to multi-byte characters in arguments and input files).
       LC_MESSAGES
              Determine the locale that should be used to  affect  the  format
              and contents of diagnostic messages written to standard error.
       NLSPATH
              Determine the location of message catalogs for the processing of
              LC_MESSAGES .

ASYNCHRONOUS EVENTS
       Default.
STDOUT
       Concatenated lines of input files shall be separated by the  <tab>  (or
       other  characters under the control of the -d option) and terminated by
       a <newline>.
STDERR
       The standard error shall be used only for diagnostic messages.
OUTPUT FILES
       None.
EXTENDED DESCRIPTION
       None.
EXIT STATUS
       The following exit values shall be returned:
        0     Successful completion.
       >0     An error occurred.

CONSEQUENCES OF ERRORS
       If one or more input files cannot be opened when the -s option  is  not
       specified, a diagnostic message shall be written to standard error, but
       no output is written to standard output. If the -s option is specified,
       the paste utility shall provide the default behavior described in Util-
       ity Description Defaults .
       The following sections are informative.
APPLICATION USAGE
       When the escape sequences of the list option-argument  are  used  in  a
       shell  script, they must be quoted; otherwise, the shell treats the '\'
       as a special character.
       Conforming applications should only use the specific backslash  escaped
       delimiters presented in this volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001. Historical
       implementations treat '\x', where 'x' is not in this list, as 'x',  but
       future  implementations are free to expand this list to recognize other
       common escapes similar to those accepted by printf and  other  standard
       utilities.
       Most  of the standard utilities work on text files. The cut utility can
       be used to turn files with arbitrary line lengths into a  set  of  text
       files containing the same data. The paste utility can be used to create
       (or recreate) files with arbitrary line lengths. For example,  if  file
       contains long lines:

              cut -b 1-500 -n file > file1
              cut -b 501- -n file > file2
       creates  file1  (a text file) with lines no longer than 500 bytes (plus
       the <newline>) and file2 that contains the remainder of the  data  from
       file.  Note  that  file2  is not a text file if there are lines in file
       that are longer than 500 + {LINE_MAX} bytes. The original file  can  be
       recreated from file1 and file2 using the command:

              paste -d "\0" file1 file2 > file
       The commands:

              paste -d "\0" ...
              paste -d "" ...
       are  not  necessarily  equivalent;  the latter is not specified by this
       volume of IEEE Std 1003.1-2001 and may result in  an  error.  The  con-
       struct  '\0' is used to mean "no separator" because historical versions
       of paste did not follow the syntax guidelines, and the command:

              paste -d"" ...
       could not be handled properly by getopt().
EXAMPLES
        1. Write out a directory in four columns:

           ls | paste - - - -
        2. Combine pairs of lines from a file into single lines:

           paste -s -d "\t\n" file
RATIONALE
       None.
FUTURE DIRECTIONS
       None.
SEE ALSO
       Utility Description Defaults, cut, grep, pr
COPYRIGHT
       Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in  electronic  form
       from IEEE Std 1003.1, 2003 Edition, Standard for Information Technology
       -- Portable Operating System Interface (POSIX),  The  Open  Group  Base
       Specifications  Issue  6,  Copyright  (C) 2001-2003 by the Institute of
       Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open  Group.  In  the
       event of any discrepancy between this version and the original IEEE and
       The Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group  Standard
       is  the  referee document. The original Standard can be obtained online
       at http://www.opengroup.org/unix/online.html .

IEEE/The Open Group                  2003                            PASTE(1P)