head
—
display first lines of a file
head |
[-qv ] [-n
count] [-c
byte_count] [file ...] |
This filter displays the first count lines of each of the
specified files, or of the standard input if no files are specified. If
count is omitted it defaults to 10. If
-c
byte_count is specified,
head
counts bytes instead of lines.
If more than a single file is specified, or the
-v
option is used, each file is preceded by a header
consisting of the string “==> XXX ≤=” where
“XXX” is the name of the file. The -q
flag disables the printing of the header in all cases.
The head
utility exits 0 on success,
and >0 if an error occurs.
The historic command line syntax of head
is supported by
this implementation.
This command is mostly compatible with GNU extensions to
head
.
The head
utility conforms to IEEE Std
1003.2-1992 (“POSIX.2”).
The head
utility appeared in
3.0BSD. It was enhanced to include the
-c
, -q
, and
-v
options for NetBSD 2.1.