NAME
head – display first lines of a file
SYNOPSIS
head [-qv] [-n count | -c bytes] [file ...]
DESCRIPTION
This filter displays the first count lines or bytes of each of the specified files, or of the standard input if no files are specified. If count is omitted it defaults to 10.
The following options are available:
- -c bytes, --bytes=bytes
-
Print bytes of each of the specified files.
- -n count, --lines=count
-
Print count lines of each of the specified files.
Both count and bytes may also be specified with size suffixes supported by expand_number(3).
- -q, --quiet, --silent
-
Suppresses printing of headers when multiple files are being examined.
- -v, --verbose
-
Prepend each file with a header.
If more than a single file is specified, or if 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.
EXIT STATUS
The head utility exits 0 on success, and >0 if an error occurs.
EXAMPLES
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 -n 1
SEE ALSO
HISTORY
The head command appeared in PWB UNIX.