NAME

paste − merge same lines of several files or subsequent lines of one file

SYNOPSIS

paste −|file1  −|file2 . . . 
paste −dlist −|file1  −|file2 . . . 
paste −s [−dlist] −|file1 . . . 

DESCRIPTION

In the first two forms, paste concatenates corresponding lines of the given input files file1, file2, etc. It treats each file as a column or columns of a table and pastes them together horizontally (parallel merging). paste is the counterpart of cat(1) which concatenates vertically, that is, one file after the other.  In the last form above, paste replaces the function of an older command with the same name by combining subsequent lines of the input file (serial merging).  If more than one file is specified with the −s option, paste(1) concatenates the merged files one below the other.  In all cases, lines are glued together with the tab character, or with characters from an optionally specified list. Output is to the standard output, so it can be used as the start of a pipe, or as a filter, if − is used in place of a filename. 

The meanings of the options are:

−d Without this option, the newline characters of each but the last file (or last line in case of the −s option) are replaced by a tab character.  This option allows replacing the tab character by one or more alternate characters (see below). 

list One or more characters immediately following −d replace the default tab as the line concatenation character.  The list is used sequentially and circularly: first, the first element on the list is used to concatenate the lines, then the next, and so on; when all elements have been used, the list is reused starting from the first element.  In parallel merging (that is, no −s option), the lines from the last file are always terminated with a newline character, not from the list. The list may contain the special escape sequences: \n (newline), \t (tab), \\ (backslash), and \0 (empty string, not a null character).  Quoting may be necessary, if characters have special meaning to the shell (e.g., to get one backslash, use −d"\\\\" ).  Characters from supplementary code sets can be specified for list. 

−s Merge subsequent lines rather than one from each input file.  Use tab for concatenation, unless a list is specified with the −d option.  Regardless of the list, the very last character of the file is forced to be a newline.

− May be used in place of any filename, to read a line from the standard input.  (There is no prompting.) 

EXAMPLES

ls │ paste −d" " − lists directory in one column

ls │ paste − − − − lists directory in four columns

paste −d"\t\n" file1 file2 lists file1 in column 1 and file2 in column 2; the columns are separated by a tab

paste −s −d"\t\n" file1 file2 merges pairs of subsequent lines first in file1, then in file2; concatenates the merged file2 below file1

DIAGNOSTICS

line too long Output lines are restricted to 511 characters. 

too many files Except for −s option, no more than 12 input files may be specified. 

INTERNATIONAL FUNCTIONS

paste can process characters from supplementary code sets as well as ASCII characters. 

SEE ALSO

cut(1), grep(1), pr(1). 

  —  Directory and File Management Utilities