1 .\" DO NOT MODIFY THIS FILE! It was generated by help2man 1.47.3.
2 .TH TAIL "1" "January 2016" "GNU coreutils 8.25" "User Commands"
4 tail \- output the last part of files
7 [\fI\,OPTION\/\fR]... [\fI\,FILE\/\fR]...
9 .\" Add any additional description here
11 Print the last 10 lines of each FILE to standard output.
12 With more than one FILE, precede each with a header giving the file name.
14 With no FILE, or when FILE is \-, read standard input.
16 Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short options too.
18 \fB\-c\fR, \fB\-\-bytes\fR=\fI\,[\/\fR+]NUM
19 output the last NUM bytes; or use \fB\-c\fR +NUM to
20 output starting with byte NUM of each file
22 \fB\-f\fR, \fB\-\-follow[=\fR{name|descriptor}]
23 output appended data as the file grows;
25 an absent option argument means 'descriptor'
28 same as \fB\-\-follow\fR=\fI\,name\/\fR \fB\-\-retry\fR
30 \fB\-n\fR, \fB\-\-lines\fR=\fI\,[\/\fR+]NUM
31 output the last NUM lines, instead of the last 10;
32 or use \fB\-n\fR +NUM to output starting with line NUM
34 \fB\-\-max\-unchanged\-stats\fR=\fI\,N\/\fR
35 with \fB\-\-follow\fR=\fI\,name\/\fR, reopen a FILE which has not
37 changed size after N (default 5) iterations
38 to see if it has been unlinked or renamed
39 (this is the usual case of rotated log files);
40 with inotify, this option is rarely useful
42 \fB\-\-pid\fR=\fI\,PID\/\fR
43 with \fB\-f\fR, terminate after process ID, PID dies
45 \fB\-q\fR, \fB\-\-quiet\fR, \fB\-\-silent\fR
46 never output headers giving file names
49 keep trying to open a file if it is inaccessible
51 \fB\-s\fR, \fB\-\-sleep\-interval\fR=\fI\,N\/\fR
52 with \fB\-f\fR, sleep for approximately N seconds
53 (default 1.0) between iterations;
54 with inotify and \fB\-\-pid\fR=\fI\,P\/\fR, check process P at
55 least once every N seconds
57 \fB\-v\fR, \fB\-\-verbose\fR
58 always output headers giving file names
60 \fB\-z\fR, \fB\-\-zero\-terminated\fR
61 line delimiter is NUL, not newline
64 display this help and exit
67 output version information and exit
69 NUM may have a multiplier suffix:
70 b 512, kB 1000, K 1024, MB 1000*1000, M 1024*1024,
71 GB 1000*1000*1000, G 1024*1024*1024, and so on for T, P, E, Z, Y.
73 With \fB\-\-follow\fR (\fB\-f\fR), tail defaults to following the file descriptor, which
74 means that even if a tail'ed file is renamed, tail will continue to track
75 its end. This default behavior is not desirable when you really want to
76 track the actual name of the file, not the file descriptor (e.g., log
77 rotation). Use \fB\-\-follow\fR=\fI\,name\/\fR in that case. That causes tail to track the
78 named file in a way that accommodates renaming, removal and creation.
80 Written by Paul Rubin, David MacKenzie, Ian Lance Taylor,
83 GNU coreutils online help: <http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>
85 Report tail translation bugs to <http://translationproject.org/team/>
87 Copyright \(co 2016 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
88 License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
90 This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.
91 There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.
96 Full documentation at: <http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/tail>
98 or available locally via: info \(aq(coreutils) tail invocation\(aq