head —
display first few lines of files
head |
[ -count
| -n
count
]
[file ... ] |
The
head utility copies the first
count lines of each specified
file to the standard output. If no files are
named,
head copies lines from the standard
input. If
count is omitted, it defaults to
10.
The options are as follows:
-
-
-count
|
-n
count- Copy the first count lines of each input
file to the standard output. count must
be a positive decimal integer.
If more than one file is specified,
head
precedes the output of each file with the following, in order to distinguish
files:
==>
file
<==
The
head utility exits 0 on success,
and >0 if an error occurs.
To display the first 500 lines of the file
foo:
$ head -n 500 foo
head can be used in conjunction with
tail(1) in the following way to,
for example, display only line 500 from the file
foo:
$ head -n 500 foo | tail
-1
cat(1),
cut(1),
less(1),
more(1),
tail(1)
The
head utility is compliant with the
IEEE Std 1003.1-2008
(“POSIX.1”) specification.
The historic syntax
-count is
supported by this implementation.
The
head utility first appeared in
1BSD.
Bill Joy, August 24, 1977.
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