Unix: Visual QuickStart Guide

Displaying file contents with cat

Instead of using more to display files, you can use cat (as in "concatenate"), which displays files but does not pause so you can read the information. Instead, it displays the file or files—which whizzzz by onscreen—and leaves you looking at the last several lines of the file (Code Listing 1.8).

The cat command also lets you redirect one or more files, offering a function that some versions of more do not.

To display file contents with cat:

1.	cat newest.programs To begin, type cat plus the file name. The file contents will appear onscreen; however, if the file is longer than a single screen, the contents will whir by, and all you'll see is the bottom lines of the file—the 24 or so that fit on a single screen. ...