sort man page on Ultrix

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sort(1)								       sort(1)

Name
       sort - sort file data

Syntax
       sort [options] [-k keydef] [+pos1[-pos2]] [file...]

Description
       The  command sorts lines of all the named files together and writes the
       result on the standard output.  The name `-' means the standard	input.
       If no input files are named, the standard input is sorted.

Options
       The  default  sort  key is an entire line.  Default ordering is lexico‐
       graphic by bytes	 in  machine  collating	 sequence.   The  ordering  is
       affected	 globally  by  the following options, one or more of which may
       appear.

       -b	   Ignores leading blanks (spaces and tabs) in	field  compar‐
		   isons.

       -d	   Sorts data according to dictionary ordering:	 letters, dig‐
		   its, and blanks only.

       -f	   Folds uppercase to lowercase while sorting.

       -i	   Ignore characters outside the ASCII range 040-0176 in  non‐
		   numeric comparisons.

       -k keydef   The keydefargument is a key field definition. The format is
		   field_start,	 [field_end]  [type],  where  field_start  and
		   field_end  are the definition of the restricted search key,
		   and type is a modifier from the option list [bdfinr]. These
		   modifiers  have  the functionality, for this key only, that
		   their  command  line	 counter-parts	have  for  the	entire
		   record.

       -n	   Sorts  fields with numbers numerically.  An initial numeric
		   string, consisting of optional blanks, optional minus sign,
		   and	zero  or  more	digits with optional decimal point, is
		   sorted by arithmetic value.	(Note that -0 is taken	to  be
		   equal to 0.)	 Option n implies option b.

       -r	   Reverses the sense of comparisons.

       -tx	   Uses specified character as field separator.

       The  notation  +pos1 -pos2 restricts a sort key to a field beginning at
       pos1 and ending just before pos2.  Pos1 and pos2	 each  have  the  form
       m.n,  optionally followed by one or more of the options bdfinr, where m
       tells a number of fields to skip from the beginning of the line	and  n
       tells  a	 number	 of  characters	 to  skip further.  If any options are
       present they override all the global ordering options for this key.  If
       the  b  option is in effect n is counted from the first nonblank in the
       field; b is attached independently to pos2.  A missing .n means	.0;  a
       missing	-pos2 means the end of the line.  Under the -tx option, fields
       are strings separated by x;  otherwise  fields  are  nonempty  nonblank
       strings separated by blanks.

       When  there  are multiple sort keys, later keys are compared only after
       all earlier keys compare equal.	Lines that otherwise compare equal are
       ordered with all bytes significant.

       These are additional options:

       -c	   Checks  sorting  order  and	displays output only if out of
		   order.

       -m	   Merges previously sorted data.

       -o name	   Uses specified file as output file.	This file may  be  the
		   same as one of the inputs.

       -T dir	   Uses specified directory to build temporary files.

       -u	   Suppresses  all duplicate entries.  Ignored bytes and bytes
		   outside keys do not participate in this comparison.

Examples
       Print in alphabetical order all the  unique  spellings  in  a  list  of
       words.  Capitalized words differ from uncapitalized.
	       sort -u +0f +0 list

       Print  the password file, sorted by user id number (the 3rd colon-sepa‐
       rated field).
	       sort -t: +2n /etc/passwd

       Print the first instance of each month in an  already  sorted  file  of
       (month day) entries.  The options -um with just one input file make the
       choice of a unique representative  from	a  set	of  equal  lines  pre‐
       dictable.
	       sort -um +0 -1 dates

Restrictions
       Very long lines are silently truncated.

Diagnostics
       Comments	 and  exits with nonzero status for various trouble conditions
       and for disorder discovered under option c.

Files
       /usr/tmp/stm*, /tmp/*	first and second tries for temporary files

See Also
       comm(1), join(1), rev(1), uniq(1)

								       sort(1)
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