List of Unix programs
Encyclopedia
This is a list of UNIX
utilities as specified by IEEE Std 1003.1-2008, which is part of the Single UNIX Specification
(SUS). These utilities can be found on UNIX Operating systems and most UNIX-like
operating systems.
Unix
Unix is a multitasking, multi-user computer operating system originally developed in 1969 by a group of AT&T employees at Bell Labs, including Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, Brian Kernighan, Douglas McIlroy, and Joe Ossanna...
utilities as specified by IEEE Std 1003.1-2008, which is part of the Single UNIX Specification
Single UNIX Specification
The Single UNIX Specification is the collective name of a family of standards for computer operating systems to qualify for the name "Unix"...
(SUS). These utilities can be found on UNIX Operating systems and most UNIX-like
Unix-like
A Unix-like operating system is one that behaves in a manner similar to a Unix system, while not necessarily conforming to or being certified to any version of the Single UNIX Specification....
operating systems.
List
| Name | Category | Description | First appeared |
|---|---|---|---|
| admin | SCCS Source Code Control System Source Code Control System is an early revision control system, geared toward program source code and other text files. It was originally developed in SNOBOL at Bell Labs in 1972 by Marc J. Rochkind for an IBM System/370 computer running OS/360 MVT... |
Create and administer SCCS Source Code Control System Source Code Control System is an early revision control system, geared toward program source code and other text files. It was originally developed in SNOBOL at Bell Labs in 1972 by Marc J. Rochkind for an IBM System/370 computer running OS/360 MVT... files |
|
| alias | Misc | Define or display aliases | |
| ar Ar (Unix) The archiver is a Unix utility that maintains groups of files as a single archive file. Today, ar is generally used only to create and update static library files that the link editor or linker uses; it can be used to create archives for any purpose, but has been largely replaced by tar for... |
Misc | Create and maintain library archives | |
| asa | Text Processing | Interpret carriage-control characters | |
| at At (Unix) In Unix-like computer operating systems,the at commandis used to schedule commands to be executed once, at a particular time in the future.... |
Process Management | Execute commands at a later time | Version 7 AT&T UNIX |
| awk AWK (programming language) The AWK utility is a data extraction and reporting tool that uses a data-driven scripting language consisting of a set of actions to be taken against textual data for the purpose of producing formatted reports... |
Text processing | Pattern scanning and processing language | Version 7 AT&T UNIX |
| basename Basename basename is a standard UNIX computer program. When basename is given a pathname, it will delete any prefix up to the last slash character and return the result... |
Filesystem | Return non-directory portion of a pathname | |
| batch | Process Management | Schedule commands to be executed in a batch queue | |
| bc Bc programming language bc, for bench calculator, is "an arbitrary precision calculator language" with syntax similar to the C programming language. bc is typically used as either a mathematical scripting language or as an interactive mathematical shell.... |
Misc | Arbitrary-precision arithmetic Arbitrary-precision arithmetic In computer science, arbitrary-precision arithmetic indicates that calculations are performed on numbers whose digits of precision are limited only by the available memory of the host system. This contrasts with the faster fixed-precision arithmetic found in most ALU hardware, which typically... language |
|
| bg Bg (Unix) bg is a job control command in Unix and Unix-like operating systems that resumes execution of a suspended process without bringing it to the foreground; the resumed process continues to execute in the background without receiving user input from the terminal. bg is required to be included in an... |
Process Management | Run jobs in the background | |
| c99 | C Programming | Compile Compiler A compiler is a computer program that transforms source code written in a programming language into another computer language... standard C C (programming language) C is a general-purpose computer programming language developed between 1969 and 1973 by Dennis Ritchie at the Bell Telephone Laboratories for use with the Unix operating system.... programs |
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| cal Cal (Unix) ' is a standard program on Unix and Unix-like operating systems that prints an ASCII calendar of the given month or year. If the user does not specify any command-line options, cal will print a calendar of the current month.- Examples : $ cal... |
Misc | Print a calendar | Version 5 AT&T UNIX |
| cat Cat (Unix) The cat command is a standard Unix program used to concatenate and display files. The name is from catenate, a synonym of concatenate.- Specification :... |
Filesystem | Concatenate and print files | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| cd | Filesystem | Change the working directory | |
| cflow | C Programming | Generate a C-language flowgraph | |
| chgrp Chgrp The chgrp command is used by unprivileged users on Unix-like systems to change the group associated with a computer file... |
Filesystem | Change the file group ownership | |
| chmod Chmod The chmod command is a Unix command that lets a user tell the system how much access it should permit to a file. It changes the file system modes of files and directories. The modes include permissions and special modes... |
Filesystem | Change the file modes/attributes/permissions | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| chown Chown The chown command is used on Unix-like systems to change the owner of a file. In most implementations, it can only be executed by the superuser. Unprivileged users who wish to change the group of a file that they own may use chgrp.-Usage examples:These examples illustrate typical syntax and use... |
Filesystem | Change the file ownership | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| cksum Cksum cksum' is a command in Unix-like operating systems that generates a checksum value for a file or stream of data. The cksum command reads each file given in its arguments, or standard input if no arguments are provided, and outputs the file's CRC checksum and byte count.The cksum command can be... |
Filesystem | Write file checksums and sizes | 4.4BSD |
| clear Clear (Unix) ' is a standard Unix computer operating system command which is used to clear the screen.Depending on the system, clear uses the terminfo or termcap database, as well as looking into the environment for the terminal type in order to deduce how to clear the screen. The Unix command clear takes no... |
Clear the screen | ||
| cmp | Filesystem | Compare two files | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| comm Comm The comm command in the Unix family of computer operating systems is a utility that is used to compare two files for common and distinct lines. comm is specified in the POSIX standard. It has been widely available on Unix-like operating systems since the mid to late 1980s.-Usage:comm reads two... |
Text Processing | Select or reject lines common to two files | Version 4 AT&T UNIX |
| command | Shell Programming | Execute a simple command | |
| compress Compress Compress is a UNIX compression program based on the LZC compression method, which is an LZW implementation using variable size pointers as in LZ78.- Description of program :Files compressed by compress are typically given the extension .Z... |
Filesystem | Compress data | 4.3BSD |
| cp Cp (Unix) cp is a UNIX command used to copy a file. Files can be copied either to the same directory or to a completely different directory, possibly on a different file system or hard disk drive. If the file is copied to the same directory, the new file must have a different name to the original; in all... |
Filesystem | Copy files | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| crontab | Misc | Schedule periodic background work | |
| csplit Csplit The csplit command in Unix is a utility that is used to split a file into two or more smaller files determined by context lines.-Usage:The command-syntax is: csplit ... |
Text Processing | Split files based on context | PWB UNIX |
| ctags Ctags Ctags is a program that generates an index file of names found in source and header files of various programming languages.Depending on the language,functions,variables,class members,macros and so onmay be indexed.... |
C Programming | Create a tags file | 3.0BSD |
| cut Cut (Unix) In computing, cut is a Unix command line utility which is used to extract sections from each line of input — usually from a file.Extraction of line segments can typically be done by bytes , characters , or fields separated by a delimiter... |
Shell Programming | Cut out selected fields of each line of a file | |
| cxref | C Programming | Generate a C-language C (programming language) C is a general-purpose computer programming language developed between 1969 and 1973 by Dennis Ritchie at the Bell Telephone Laboratories for use with the Unix operating system.... program cross-reference table |
|
| date Date (Unix) The Unix date command displays the time and date. The super-user can use it to set the system clock.- Usage :With no options, the date command displays the current date and time, including the abbreviated day name, abbreviated month name, day of the month, the time separated by colons, the timezone... |
Misc | Write the date and time | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| dd Dd (Unix) In computing, dd is a common Unix program whose primary purpose is the low-level copying and conversion of raw data. According to the manual page for Version 7 Unix, it will "convert and copy a file". It is used to copy a specified number of bytes or blocks, performing on-the-fly byte order... |
Filesystem | Convert and copy a file | |
| delta | SCCS | Make a delta (change) to an SCCS file | |
| df Df (Unix) df is a standard Unix computer program used to display the amount of available disk space for filesystems on which the invoking user has appropriate read access... |
Filesystem | Report free disk space | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| diff Diff In computing, diff is a file comparison utility that outputs the differences between two files. It is typically used to show the changes between one version of a file and a former version of the same file. Diff displays the changes made per line for text files. Modern implementations also... |
Text processing | Compare two files | |
| dirname Dirname dirname is a standard UNIX computer program. When dirname is given a pathname, it will delete any suffix beginning with the last slash character and return the result... |
Filesystem | Return the directory portion of a pathname | |
| du Du (Unix) du is a standard Unix program used to estimate file space usage—space used under a particular directory or files on a file system.- Specification :... |
Filesystem | Estimate file space usage | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| echo | Shell programming | Write arguments to standard output | |
| ed Ed (text editor) ed is a line editor for the Unix operating system. It was one of the first end-user programs hosted on the system and has been standard in Unix-based systems ever since. ed was originally written in PDP-11/20 assembler by Ken Thompson in 1971... |
Text processing | The standard text editor | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| env | Misc | Set the environment for command invocation | |
| ex | Text processing | Text editor | BSD |
| expand Expand (Unix) expand is a program that converts tab characters into groups of space characters. It is available in Unix operating systems and many Unix-like operating systems.For example: $ echo -e "foo\tbar" | expand | xxd -g 1 -u... |
Text Processing | Convert tabs to spaces | |
| expr Expr expr is a command line Unix utility which evaluates an expression and outputs the corresponding value. It first appeared in Unix v7 as a standalone program, and was later incorporated into the shell as a built-in command.Syntax: expr ... |
Shell Programming | Evaluate arguments as an expression | |
| false | Shell programming | Return false value | |
| fc Fc (Unix) ' is a standard program on Unix that lists or edits and reexecutes, commands previously entered to an interactive shell. fc is a built-in command in the bash shell; help fc will show usage information.... |
Misc | Process the command history list | |
| fg Fg (Unix) fg is a job control command in Unix and Unix-like operating systems that resumes execution of a suspended process by bringing it to the foreground and thus redirecting its standard input and output streams to the user's terminal... |
Process Management | Run jobs in the foreground | |
| file | Filesystem | Determine file type | Version 4 AT&T UNIX |
| find Find In Unix-like and some other operating systems, find is a command-line utility that searches through one or more directory trees of a file system, locates files based on some user-specified criteria and applies a user-specified action on each matched file... |
Filesystem | Find files | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| fold Fold (Unix) Fold is a Unix command used for making a file with long lines more readable on a limited width terminal. Most Linux terminals have a default screen width of 80, and therefore reading files with long lines could get annoying. The fold command puts a line feed every X characters if it doesn't... |
Text processing | Filter for folding lines | |
| fort77 | FORTRAN77 Programming | FORTRAN Fortran Fortran is a general-purpose, procedural, imperative programming language that is especially suited to numeric computation and scientific computing... compiler |
|
| fuser Fuser (Unix) fuser is a UNIX command used to show which processes are using a specified file, file system, or unix socket. For example, to check process IDs and users accessing a USB drive: # fuser -m -u /mnt/usb1 /mnt/usb1: 1347c 1348c 1349c... |
Process Management | List process IDs Process identifier In computing, the process identifier is a number used by most operating system kernels to uniquely identify a process... of all processes that have one or more files open |
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| gencat | Misc | Generate a formatted message catalog | |
| get | SCCS | Get a version of an SCCS file | |
| getconf | Misc | Get configuration values | |
| getopts Getopts getopts is a built-in Unix shell command for parsing command-line arguments.It is designed to process command line arguments that follow the .-History:... |
Shell Programming | Parse utility options | |
| grep Grep grep is a command-line text-search utility originally written for Unix. The name comes from the ed command g/re/p... |
Misc | Search text for a pattern | |
| hash Hash (Unix) hash is a Unix command that prints the location information for the commands found.-Description:When the user gives a command, the shell searches for the command in the path specified in the PATH environmental variable and stores the location in the hash. This command can be used to search for the... |
Misc | hash database access method | |
| head Head (Unix) head is a program on Unix and Unix-like systems used to display the first few lines of a text file or piped data. The command syntax is: head [options] <file_name>... |
Text processing | Copy the first part of files | PWB UNIX |
| iconv Iconv iconv is a computer program and a standardized API used to convert between different character encodings.-iconv API:The iconv API is the standard programming interface for converting character strings from one character encoding to another in Unix-like operating systems.Initially appearing on the... |
Text processing | Codeset conversion | |
| id Id (Unix) In computer software, id is a program in Unix-like operating systems that prints the user or group identifier of the account by which the program is executed; an example of the command id as executed by user alice:alice@darkstar:~$ id... |
Misc | Return user identity | 4.4BSD |
| ipcrm Ipcrm The ipcrm command will mark System Vinterprocess communication API kernel entities for removal,deferred until the last connected process detaches.System V IPC kernel entities are:*Shared memory segments*Message queues*Semaphore arrays... |
Misc | Remove a message queue, semaphore set, or shared memory segment identifier | |
| ipcs Ipcs The ipcs command will list System Vinterprocess communication API kernel entities to stdout.System V IPC kernel entities are:*Shared memory segments*Message queues*Semaphore arrays... |
Misc | Report interprocess communication facilities status | |
| jobs | Process Management | Display status of jobs in the current session | |
| join Join (Unix) join is a command in Unix-like operating systems that merges the lines of two sorted text files based on the presence of a common field. It is similar to the join operator used in relational databases but operating on text files.... |
Text Processing | Merges two sorted text files based on the presence of a common field | |
| kill Kill (Unix) In computing, kill is a command that is used in several popular operating systems to send signals to running processes, for example to request the termination of this process.-Unix and Unix-like:... |
Process Management | Terminate or signal processes | Version 3 AT&T UNIX |
| lex Lex programming tool Lex is a computer program that generates lexical analyzers . Lex is commonly used with the yacc parser generator. Lex, originally written by Mike Lesk and Eric Schmidt, is the standard lexical analyzer generator on many Unix systems, and a tool exhibiting its behavior is specified as part of the... |
C Programming | Generate programs for lexical tasks | |
| link Link (Unix) The link utility is a Unix command line program that creates a hard link from an existing directory entry to a new directory entry. It does no more than call the link system function. It does not perform error checking before attempting to create the link. It returns an exit status that indicates... |
Filesystem | Create a hard link to a file | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| ln Ln (Unix) ln is a standard Unix command used to create links to files.- Link files :Links allow more than one file name to refer to the same file, elsewhere.There are two types of links, both of which are created by ln:... |
Filesystem | Link files | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| locale Locale In computing, locale is a set of parameters that defines the user's language, country and any special variant preferences that the user wants to see in their user interface... |
Misc | Get locale-specific information | |
| localedef | Misc | Define locale environment | |
| logger | Shell programming | Log messages | |
| logname Logname In computer software, logname is a program in Unix and Unix-like operating systems that prints the name of the user executing the command. It corresponds to the LOGNAME variable in the system-state environment. The logname system call and command appeared for the first time in UNIX System... |
Misc | Return the user's login name | 4.4BSD |
| lp Lp (Unix) The lp command is used on many Unix-like systems to assign jobs to printer queues. The name derives from "lineprinter", though it has become the commonly used command for any sort of printer... |
Text Processing | Send files to a printer | |
| ls Ls In computing, ls is a command to list files in Unix and Unix-like operating systems. ls is specified by POSIX and the Single UNIX Specification.- History :An ls utility appeared in the original version of AT&T UNIX... |
Filesystem | List directory contents | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| m4 M4 (computer language) m4 is a general purpose macro processor designed by Brian Kernighan and Dennis Ritchie. m4 is an extension of an earlier macro processor m3, written by Ritchie for the AP-3 minicomputer.-Use:... |
Misc | Macro processor | PWB UNIX |
| mailx Mailx mailx is a Unix utility program for sending and receiving mail, also known as a Mail User Agent program. It is an improved version of the mail utility.mailx is a lightweight console application mail program which has a command syntax similar to ed.... |
Misc | Process messages | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| make | Programming | Maintain, update, and regenerate groups of programs | |
| man Manual page (Unix) Man pages are the extensive documentation that comes preinstalled with almost all substantial Unix and Unix-like operating systems. The Unix command used to display them is man. Each page is a self-contained document.- Usage :... |
Misc | Display system documentation | |
| mesg Mesg mesg is a Unix command that sets or reports the permission other users have to write to your terminal using the talk and write commands. It is invoked as:mesg [y|n]The 'y' and 'n' options respectively allow and disallow write access to your terminal... |
Misc | Permit or deny messages | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| mkdir Mkdir The mkdir command in the Unix, DOS, OS/2 and Microsoft Windows operating systems is used to make a new directory. In DOS, OS/2 and Windows the command is often abbreviated to md.-Usage:Normal usage is as straightforward as follows:... |
Filesystem | Make directories | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| mkfifo | Filesystem | Make FIFO FIFO FIFO is an acronym for First In, First Out, an abstraction related to ways of organizing and manipulation of data relative to time and prioritization... special files |
4.4BSD |
| more | Text processing | Display files on a page-by-page basis | |
| mv Mv mv is a Unix command that moves one or more files or directories from one place to another. Since it can "move" files from one filename to another, it is also used to rename files. Using mv requires the user to have write permission for the directories which the file will move between... |
Filesystem | Move files | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| newgrp | Misc | Change to a new group | Version 6 AT&T UNIX |
| nice Nice (Unix) nice is a program found on Unix and Unix-like operating systems such as Linux. nice directly maps to a kernel call of the same name. For a given process, it changes the priority in the kernel's scheduler. A niceness of −20 is the highest priority and 19 or 20 is the lowest priority... |
Process Management | Invoke a utility with an altered nice value | Version 4 AT&T UNIX |
| nl Nl (Unix) nl is a Unix utility for numbering lines, either from a file or from standard input, reproducing output on standard output.It has a number of switches:*a - number all lines*t - number lines with printable text only*n - no line numbering... |
Text Processing | Line numbering filter | |
| nm Nm (Unix) The nm command ships with a number of later versions of Unix and similar operating systems. nm is used to examine binary files and to display the contents of those files, or meta information stored in them, specifically the symbol table... |
C Programming | Write the name list of an object file Object file An object file is a file containing relocatable format machine code that is usually not directly executable. Object files are produced by an assembler, compiler, or other language translator, and used as input to the linker.... |
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| nohup Nohup nohup is a POSIX command to ignore the HUP signal, enabling the command to keep running after the user who issues the command has logged out. The HUP signal is by convention the way a terminal warns depending processes of logout.... |
Process Management | Invoke a utility immune to hangups SIGHUP On POSIX-compliant platforms, SIGHUP is a signal sent to a process when its controlling terminal is closed.... |
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| od Od (Unix) od is an octal dumping program for Unix and Unix-like systems. It can also dump hexadecimal or decimal data.od is one of the earliest Unix programs, having appeared in version 1 AT&T Unix. It is also specified in the POSIX standards... |
Misc | Dump files in various formats | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| paste Paste (Unix) paste is a Unix command line utility which is used to join files horizontally by outputting lines consisting of the sequentially corresponding lines of each file specified, separated by tabs, to the standard output... |
Text processing | Merge corresponding or subsequent lines of files | Version 32V AT&T UNIX |
| patch Patch (Unix) patch is a Unix program that updates text files according to instructions contained in a separate file, called a patch file. The patch file is a text file that consists of a list of differences and is produced by running the related diff program with the original and updated file as arguments... |
Text processing | Apply changes to files | |
| pathchk | Filesystem | Check pathnames | |
| pax | Misc | Portable archive interchange | 4.4BSD |
| pr Pr (Unix) pr is used to paginate or columnate files for printing.It is a required program in a POSIX-compliant environment and has been implemented by GNU as part of the GNU Core Utilities.-External links:*]]*... |
Text processing | Print files | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| printf Printf (Unix) printf shell builtin command accepts a format string, which specifies methods for formatting items and a list of items to be formatted. Named for the intention of printing to a printer, it actually outputs to STDOUT... |
Shell programming | Write formatted output | 4.3BSD-Reno |
| prs PRS - Computers and telecommunication :* Procedural Reasoning System, an architecture for developing intelligent agents* Premium Rate Service, internationally available telephone-based premium services.... |
SCCS | Print an SCCS file | |
| ps Ps (Unix) In most Unix-like operating systems, the ps program displays the currently-running processes. A related Unix utility named top provides a real-time view of the running processes.... |
Process Management | Report process status | Version 4 AT&T UNIX |
| pwd Pwd In Unix-like and some other operating systems, the pwd command is used to output the path of the current working directory.The command is a shell builtin in certain Unix shells such as sh, and bash... |
Filesystem | print working directory - Return working directory name | |
| qalter | Batch Utilities | Alter batch job | |
| qdel | Batch Utilities | Delete batch jobs | |
| qhold | Batch Utilities | Hold batch jobs | |
| qmove | Batch Utilities | Move batch jobs | |
| qmsg | Batch Utilities | Send message to batch jobs | |
| qrerun | Batch Utilities | Rerun batch jobs | |
| qrls | Batch Utilities | Release batch jobs | |
| qselect | Batch Utilities | Select batch jobs | |
| qsig QSIG QSIG is an ISDN based signaling protocol for signaling between private branch exchanges in a Private Integrated Services Network . It makes use of the connection-level Q.931 protocol and the application-level ROSE protocol... |
Batch Utilities | Signal batch jobs | |
| qstat | Batch Utilities | Show status of batch jobs | |
| qsub | Batch Utilities | Submit a script | |
| read | Shell Programming | Read a line from standard input | |
| renice | Process Management | Set nice values of running processes | 4.0BSD |
| rm Rm (Unix) rm is a basic UNIX command used to remove objects such as files, directories, device nodes, symbolic links, and so on from the filesystem... |
Filesystem | Remove directory entries | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| rmdel | SCCS | Remove a delta from an SCCS file | |
| rmdir Rmdir rmdir is a command which will remove an empty directory on a Unix, DOS, OS/2 or Microsoft Windows operating system. In Unix, Linux, and MacOS, it is case sensitive, whereas DOS, OS/2 and Windows , you can type the characters in any combination of upper case and lower case letters, and rd/rmdir... |
Filesystem | Remove directories | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| sact | SCCS | Print current SCCS file-editing activity | |
| sccs | SCCS Source Code Control System Source Code Control System is an early revision control system, geared toward program source code and other text files. It was originally developed in SNOBOL at Bell Labs in 1972 by Marc J. Rochkind for an IBM System/370 computer running OS/360 MVT... |
Front end for the SCCS subsystem | |
| sed Sed sed is a Unix utility that parses text and implements a programming language which can apply transformations to such text. It reads input line by line , applying the operation which has been specified via the command line , and then outputs the line. It was developed from 1973 to 1974 as a Unix... |
Text processing | Stream editor | Version 7 AT&T UNIX |
| sh Bourne shell The Bourne shell, or sh, was the default Unix shell of Unix Version 7 and most Unix-like systems continue to have /bin/sh - which will be the Bourne shell, or a symbolic link or hard link to a compatible shell - even when more modern shells are used by most users.Developed by Stephen Bourne at AT&T... |
Shell programming | Shell Shell (computing) A shell is a piece of software that provides an interface for users of an operating system which provides access to the services of a kernel. However, the term is also applied very loosely to applications and may include any software that is "built around" a particular component, such as web... , the standard command language interpreter |
Version 7 AT&T UNIX (in earlier versions, sh was either the Thompson shell Thompson shell The Thompson shell was the first Unix shell, introduced in the first version of Unix in 1971, and was written by Ken Thompson.It was a simple command interpreter, not designed for scripting, but nonetheless introduced several innovative features to the command line interface and led to the... or the PWB shell PWB shell The PWB shell was an early Unix shell.Distributed with some versions of Programmer's Workbench UNIX circa 1975-1977, it was a modified version of the Thompson shell with additional features to increase usability for programming, and was maintained by John Mashey and various others The PWB shell... ) |
| sleep Sleep (Unix) sleep is a Unix command line program that suspends program execution for a specified period of time.The sleep instruction suspends the calling process for at least the specified number of seconds , minutes, hours or days.-Usage:... |
Shell programming | Suspend execution for an interval | Version 4 AT&T UNIX |
| sort Sort (Unix) sort is a standard Unix command line program that prints the lines of its input or concatenation of all files listed in its argument list in sorted order. Sorting is done based on one or more sort keys extracted from each line of input. By default, the entire input is taken as sort key... |
Text Processing | Sort, merge, or sequence check text files | |
| split Split (Unix) split is a Unix utility most commonly used to split a file into two or more smaller files.-Usage:The command-syntax is: split [OPTION] [INPUT [PREFIX]]... |
Misc | Split files into pieces | Version 3 AT&T UNIX |
| strings Strings (Unix) In computer software, strings is a program in Unix-like operating systems that finds and prints text strings embedded in binary files such as executables.It can be used on object files, and core dumps.... |
C Programming | Find printable strings in files | |
| strip Strip (Unix) In Unix and Unix-like operating systems, the strip program removes unnecessary information from executable binary programs and object files, thus potentially resulting in better performance and sometimes significantly less disk space usage... |
C Programming | Remove unnecessary information from executable files | |
| stty Stty The Unix stty command is used for changing the settings of a Unix computer terminal. This command is used to change keystrokes, irregular character handling, and more. Stty gives a full set of features that are also available in ncurses for programmers but simplifies it by building it in to a... |
Misc | Set the options for a terminal | |
| tabs | Misc | Set terminal tabs | PWB UNIX |
| tail Tail (Unix) tail is a program on Unix and Unix-like systems used to display the last few lines of a text file or piped data.-Syntax:The command-syntax is: tail [options]... |
Text processing | Copy the last part of a file | PWB UNIX |
| talk Talk (Unix) talk was a program originally used for live text communication between different users of a single multi-user computer running the Unix operating system. In 1983, a new version of talk was introduced as a Unix command with BSD v4.2, and would also accommodate electronic conversations between users... |
Misc | Talk to another user | 4.2BSD |
| tee | Shell programming | Duplicate standard input | |
| test Test (Unix) test is a command in Unix that evaluates conditional expressions.-Description:The test command evaluates the expression parameter. In some shells , it is actually a shell builtin, even though external version still exists. In the second form of the command, the [ ] must be surrounded by blank... |
Shell programming | Evaluate expression Expression (programming) An expression in a programming language is a combination of explicit values, constants, variables, operators, and functions that are interpreted according to the particular rules of precedence and of association for a particular programming language, which computes and then produces another value... |
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| time Time (Unix) time is a command in the Unix operating systems. It is used to determine the duration of execution of a particular command.-Usage:To use the command, simply precede any command by the word time, such as:time ls... |
Process Management | Time a simple command | Version 3 AT&T UNIX |
| touch Touch (Unix) touch is a standard Unix program used to change a file's access and modification timestamps. It is also used to create a new empty file.- History :A touch utility appeared in Version 7 AT&T UNIX... |
Filesystem | Change file access and modification times | Version 7 AT&T UNIX |
| tput Tput In computing, tput is a standard Unix operating system command which is used to set terminal features.Depending on the system, tput uses the terminfo or termcap database, as well as looking into the environment for the terminal type.-History:... |
Misc | Change terminal Computer terminal A computer terminal is an electronic or electromechanical hardware device that is used for entering data into, and displaying data from, a computer or a computing system... characteristics |
System V |
| tr Tr (Unix) tr is a command in Unix-like operating systems.When executed, the program reads from the standard input and writes to the standard output. It takes as parameters two sets of characters, and replaces occurrences of the characters in the first set with the corresponding elements from the other set... |
Text processing | Translate characters | Version 4 AT&T UNIX |
| true True (Unix) In Unix-like operating systems, true and false are commands whose only function is to always return the value 0 or 1.-Usage:The exit status of a command is often used to indicate success or failure of the command. The true and false commands represent the logical value of command success, because... |
Shell programming | Return true value | |
| tsort Tsort (Unix) The tsort program is a command line utility on Unix-like platforms, that performs a topological sort on its input.-History:According to its info page, this command was initially written for providing an ordering of object files that allowed the linker to process them sequentially .Note that the... |
Text processing | Topological sort | Version 7 AT&T UNIX |
| tty Tty (Unix) tty is a Unix command that prints to standard output the name of the terminal connected to standard input. The name of the program comes from teletypewriter, abbreviated "TTY".When the program runs, it will output something like this:$ tty/dev/pts/4... |
Misc | Return user's terminal Computer terminal A computer terminal is an electronic or electromechanical hardware device that is used for entering data into, and displaying data from, a computer or a computing system... name |
Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| type Type (Unix) type is a Unix command that describes how its arguments would be interpreted if used as command names.-Function:Where applicable, type will display the command name's path... |
Misc | Displays how a name would be interpreted if used as a command | |
| ulimit | Misc | Set or report file size limit | |
| umask Umask umask is a command and a function in POSIX environments that sets the file mode creation mask of the current process which limits the permission modes for files and directories created by the process... |
Misc | Get or set the file mode creation mask | |
| unalias | Misc | Remove alias definitions | |
| uname Uname uname is a software program in Unix and Unix-like computer operating systems that prints the name, version and other details about the current machine and the operating system running on it... |
Misc | Return system name | PWB UNIX |
| uncompress Uncompress uncompress is a shell command in Unix-like environments.The uncompress utility will restore files to their original state after they have been compressed using the compress utility. If no files are specified, the standard input will be uncompressed to the standard output.This utility supports... |
Misc | Expand compressed data | 4.3BSD |
| unexpand Unexpand unexpand is a command in the UNIX Operating System. It is used to convert groups of space characters into tabs.For example: $ echo " asdf sdf" | unexpand | od -c 0000000 \t \t a s d f s d f \n 0000014... |
Text Processing | Convert spaces to tabs | 3.0BSD |
| unget | SCCS | Undo a previous get of an SCCS file | |
| uniq Uniq uniq is a Unix utility which, when fed a text file, outputs the file with adjacent identical lines collapsed to one. It is a kind of filter program. Typically it is used after sort... |
Text Processing | Report or filter out repeated lines in a file | Version 3 AT&T UNIX |
| unlink Unlink (Unix) In Unix-like operating systems, unlink is a system call and a command line utility to delete files. The program directly interfaces the system call, which removes the file name and directories like rm and rmdir... |
Filesystem | Call the unlink function | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| uucp UUCP UUCP is an abbreviation for Unix-to-Unix Copy. The term generally refers to a suite of computer programs and protocols allowing remote execution of commands and transfer of files, email and netnews between computers. Specifically, a command named uucp is one of the programs in the suite; it... |
Network | System-to-system copy | |
| uudecode | Network | Decode a binary file | 4.0BSD |
| uuencode Uuencode Uuencoding is a form of binary-to-text encoding that originated in the Unix program uuencode, for encoding binary data for transmission over the uucp mail system.The name "uuencoding" is derived from "Unix-to-Unix encoding"... |
Network | Encode a binary file | 4.0BSD |
| uustat | Network | uucp UUCP UUCP is an abbreviation for Unix-to-Unix Copy. The term generally refers to a suite of computer programs and protocols allowing remote execution of commands and transfer of files, email and netnews between computers. Specifically, a command named uucp is one of the programs in the suite; it... status inquiry and job control |
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| uux | Process Management | Remote command execution | |
| val | SCCS | Validate SCCS files | |
| vi Vi vi is a screen-oriented text editor originally created for the Unix operating system. The portable subset of the behavior of vi and programs based on it, and the ex editor language supported within these programs, is described by the Single Unix Specification and POSIX.The original code for vi... |
Text processing | Screen-oriented (visual) display editor | BSD |
| wait | Process Management | Await process completion | |
| wc Wc (Unix) wc is a command in Unix-like operating systems.The program reads either standard input or a list of files and generates one or more of the following statistics: number of bytes, number of words, and number of lines... |
Text processing | Line, word and byte or character count | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| what | SCCS Source Code Control System Source Code Control System is an early revision control system, geared toward program source code and other text files. It was originally developed in SNOBOL at Bell Labs in 1972 by Marc J. Rochkind for an IBM System/370 computer running OS/360 MVT... |
Identify SCCS files | |
| who Who (Unix) The standard Unix command who displays a list of users who are currently logged into a computer.The who command is related to the command w, which provides the same information but also displays additional data and statistics.- Specification :... |
System Administration | Display who is on the system | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| write Write (Unix) write can refer to several Unix commands. All known variations of write are used to write messages to another user. The most popular variation sends a message directly to another user's TTY.-Usage:The syntax for the write command is:... |
Misc | Write to another user's terminal | Version 1 AT&T UNIX |
| xargs Xargs xargs is a command on Unix and most Unix-like operating systems used to build and execute command lines from standard input. Under the Linux kernel before version 2.6.23, arbitrarily long lists of parameters could not be passed to a command, so xargs breaks the list of arguments into sublists small... |
Shell Programming | Construct argument lists and invoke utility | PWB UNIX |
| yacc Yacc The computer program yacc is a parser generator developed by Stephen C. Johnson at AT&T for the Unix operating system. The name is an acronym for "Yet Another Compiler Compiler." It generates a parser based on an analytic grammar written in a notation similar to BNF.Yacc used to be available as... |
C Programming | Yet another compiler Compiler A compiler is a computer program that transforms source code written in a programming language into another computer language... compiler |
PWB UNIX |
| zcat | Text Processing | Expand and concatenate data | |
See also
- List of GNOME applications
- List of GNU packages
- List of KDE applications
- List of Unix daemons
- List of web browsers for Unix/Linux
- Unix philosophyUnix philosophyThe Unix philosophy is a set of cultural norms and philosophical approaches to developing software based on the experience of leading developers of the Unix operating system.-McIlroy: A Quarter Century of Unix:...
External links
- IEEE Std 1003.1,2004 specifications
- IEEE Std 1003.1,2008 specifications
- Rosetta Stone For *Nix – configurable list of equivalent programs for *nix systems.
- The Unix Acronym List – explains the names of many Unix commands.
- The UNIX System Homepage