![[BACK]](/cvsweb/icons/back.gif){kind=icon}
Return to sort.1 CVS log ![[TXT]](/cvsweb/icons/text.gif){kind=icon}
![[DIR]](/cvsweb/icons/dir.gif){kind=icon}
Up to [CSRG BSD Unix] / 43BSDReno / usr.bin / sort|
Return to sort.1 CVS log | Up to [CSRG BSD Unix] / 43BSDReno / usr.bin / sort |
1.1 root 1: .\" Copyright (c) 1990 Regents of the University of California.
2: .\" All rights reserved. The Berkeley software License Agreement
3: .\" specifies the terms and conditions for redistribution.
4: .\"
5: .\" @(#)sort.1 6.5 (Berkeley) 6/24/90
6: .\"
7: .TH SORT 1 "June 24, 1990
8: .AT 3
9: .SH NAME
10: sort \- sort or merge files
11: .SH SYNOPSIS
12: .B sort
13: [
14: .I -mubdfinrtx
15: ]
16: [ \fB+\fIpos1 \fR [ \fB\-\fIpos2 \fR]
17: ] ...
18: [
19: .B \-o
20: name ] [
21: .B \-T
22: directory ] [ name ] ...
23: .SH DESCRIPTION
24: .I Sort
25: sorts lines of all the named files together and writes the result on
26: the standard output. The name `\-' means the standard input.
27: If no input files are named, the standard input is sorted.
28: .LP
29: The default sort key is an entire line.
30: Default ordering is lexicographic by bytes in machine collating sequence.
31: The ordering is affected globally by the following options,
32: one or more of which may appear.
33: .TP 5
34: .B b
35: Ignore leading blanks (spaces and tabs) in field comparisons.
36: .TP 5
37: .B d
38: `Dictionary' order: only letters, digits and blanks
39: are significant in comparisons.
40: .TP 5
41: .B f
42: Fold upper case letters onto lower case.
43: .TP 5
44: .B i
45: Ignore characters outside the ASCII range 040-0176 in nonnumeric comparisons.
46: .TP 5
47: .B n
48: An initial numeric string, consisting of optional blanks, optional minus sign,
49: and zero or more digits with optional decimal point,
50: is sorted by arithmetic value. (Note that \fB-0\fP is considered equal
51: to \fB0\fP.) Option
52: .B n
53: implies option
54: .B b.
55: .TP 5
56: .B r
57: Reverse the sense of comparisons.
58: .TP 5
59: .BI t x
60: `Tab character' separating fields is
61: .IR x .
62: .LP
63: The notation
64: .BI + "pos1 " "\-\fIpos2"
65: restricts a sort key to a field beginning at
66: .I pos1
67: and ending just before
68: .IR pos2 .
69: .I Pos1
70: and
71: .I pos2
72: each have the form
73: .IB m . n\fR,
74: optionally followed by one or more of the flags
75: .B bdf\&inr,
76: where
77: .I m
78: tells a number of fields to skip from the beginning of the line and
79: .I n
80: tells a number of characters to skip further.
81: If any flags are present they override all the global
82: ordering options for this key. If the
83: .B b
84: option is in effect
85: .I n
86: is counted from the first nonblank in the field;
87: .B b
88: is attached independently to
89: .IR pos2 .
90: A missing \&\fB.\fIn\fR means .0; a missing
91: .BI \- pos2
92: means the end of the line. Under the
93: .BI \-t x
94: option, fields are strings separated by
95: .IR x ;
96: otherwise fields are nonempty nonblank strings separated by blanks.
97: .LP
98: When there are multiple sort keys, later keys
99: are compared only after all earlier keys compare equal.
100: Lines that otherwise compare equal are ordered with all bytes significant.
101: .LP
102: These option arguments are also understood:
103: .TP 5
104: .B c
105: Check that the input file is sorted according to the ordering rules;
106: give no output unless the file is out of sort.
107: .TP 5
108: .B m
109: Merge only, the input files are already sorted.
110: .TP 5
111: .B o
112: The next argument is the name of an output file
113: to use instead of the standard output.
114: This file may be the same as one of the inputs.
115: .TP 5
116: .B T
117: The next argument is the name of a directory in which temporary files
118: should be made.
119: .TP 5
120: .B u
121: Suppress all but one in each set of equal lines.
122: Ignored bytes and bytes outside keys do not participate in this comparison.
123: .SH EXAMPLES
124: .LP
125: Print in alphabetical order all the unique spellings in a list of words.
126: Capitalized words differ from uncapitalized.
127: .LP
128: .ti +8
129: sort \-u +0f +0 list
130: .LP
131: Print the password file
132: .RI ( passwd (5))
133: sorted by user id number (the 3rd colon-separated field).
134: .LP
135: .ti +8
136: sort \-t: +2n /etc/passwd
137: .LP
138: Print the first instance of each month in an already sorted file
139: of (month day) entries.
140: The options
141: .B \-um
142: with just one input file make the choice of a
143: unique representative from a set of equal lines predictable.
144: .LP
145: .ti +8
146: sort \-um +0 \-1 dates
147: .SH FILES
148: /usr/tmp/stm*, /tmp/* first and second tries for
149: temporary files
150: .SH "SEE ALSO"
151: uniq(1),
152: comm(1),
153: rev(1),
154: join(1)
155: .SH DIAGNOSTICS
156: Comments and exits with nonzero status for various trouble
157: conditions and for disorder discovered under option
158: .BR \-c .
159: .SH BUGS
160: Very long lines are silently truncated.
This archive runs on limited infrastructure. Preserving old code on modern bandwidth. Automated agents are requested to crawl responsibly.