Linux and Unix cut command tutorial with examples
Tutorial on using cut, a UNIX and Linux command for cutting sections from each line of files. Examples of cutting by character, byte position, cutting based on delimiter and how to modify the output delimiter.
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What is the cut command in UNIX? ¶
The cut
command in UNIX is a command line utility for cutting sections from
each line of files and writing the result to standard output. It can be used to
cut parts of a line by byte position, character and delimiter. It can also be
used to cut data from file formats like CSV.
How to cut by byte position ¶
To cut out a section of a line by specifying a byte position use the -b
option.
echo 'baz' | cut -b 2
a
echo 'baz' | cut -b 1-2
ba
echo 'baz' | cut -b 1,3
bz
How to cut by character ¶
To cut by character use the -c
option. This selects the characters given to
the -c
option. This can be a list of comma separated numbers, a range of
numbers or a single number.
Where your input stream is character based -c
can be a better option than
selecting by bytes as often characters are more than one byte.
In the following example character ‘♣’ is three bytes. By using the -c
option
the character can be correctly selected along with any other characters that are
of interest.
echo '♣foobar' | cut -c 1,6
♣a
echo '♣foobar' | cut -c 1-3
♣fo
How to cut based on a delimiter ¶
To cut using a delimiter use the -d
option. This is normally used in
conjunction with the -f
option to specify the field that should be cut.
In the following example a CSV file exists and is saved as names.csv
.
John,Smith,34,London
Arthur,Evans,21,Newport
George,Jones,32,Truro
The delimiter can be set to a comma with -d ','
. cut
can then pull out the
fields of interest with the -f
flag. In the following example the first field
is cut.
cut -d ',' -f 1 names.csv
John
Arthur
George
Multiple fields can be cut by passing a comma separated list.
cut -d ',' -f 1,4 names.csv
John,London
Arthur,Newport
George,Truro
How to cut by complement pattern ¶
To cut by complement us the --complement
option. Note this option is not
available on the BSD version of cut
. The --complement
option selects the
inverse of the options passed to cut.
In the following example the -c
option is used to select the first character.
Because the --complement
option is also passed to cut
the second and third
characters are cut.
echo 'foo' | cut --complement -c 1
oo
How to modify the output delimiter ¶
To modify the output delimiter use the --output-delimiter
option. Note that
this option is not available on the BSD version of cut
. In the following
example a semi-colon is converted to a space and the first, third and fourth
fields are selected.
echo 'how;now;brown;cow' | cut -d ';' -f 1,3,4 --output-delimiter=' '
how brown cow
Further reading ¶
- cut man page
- 10 Practical Linux Cut Command Examples to Select File Columns
- Linux and Unix cut command
- Cut Command in Unix ( Linux) Examples
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