Lesson 23: Viewing the first and last lines in files

In addition to the cat command (to print the entire file contents), commands head and tail can be used to display the first or last line(s), ignoring the rest of the file contents.

To print the first line(s) from a file, use the head command with the -n NUM switch (where NUM is the number of lines to print, 10 by default).

[learner planets]$ head -n 2 earth.txt
Earth is the third planet in the solar system.
Earth is the third planet in the solar system.

Command tail will print the last NUM lines, or 10 if the -n switch is omitted.

[learner number]$ cd ../planets
[learner planets]$ tail -n 3 earth.txt
Earth is the third planet in the solar system.
The highest point found on Earth is Mount Everest.
70% of the Earth’s surface is covered by water.

We can follow the output of any file (to see live output) by passing the -f switch to tail.