NAME

cat — concatenate files

SYNOPSIS

DESCRIPTION

cat reads each file in sequence and writes it on the standard output. If no file is given or if file is "-", cat reads from the standard input.

OPTIONS

The -u option is ignored, present only for POSIX compatibility.

EXIT STATUS

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

EXAMPLES

‘cat file1 - file2 - file3’

Print the contents of file1; then copy standard input until EOF (^D) is received; then print the contents of file2; then the rest of standard input until EOF (^D) is received again; finally cat will print the contents of file3. Note that when standard input refers to a file, the second dash does nothing as there isn't any remaining data to print.

‘time cat’

Get a stopwatch utility which stops once EOF is pressed.

STANDARDS

cat is mostly compliant with the IEEE Std 1003.1-2024 (“POSIX.1”) specification.

AUTHORS

Haelwenn (lanodan) Monnier <contact+utils@hacktivis.me>