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NAME | SYNOPSIS | DESCRIPTION | OPTIONS | ENVIRONMENT | HISTORY | BUGS | EXAMPLES | SEE ALSO | REPORTING BUGS | AVAILABILITY |
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COLUMN(1) User Commands COLUMN(1)
column - columnate lists
column [options] [file ...]
The column utility formats its input into multiple columns. The
util support three modes:
columns are filled before rows
This is the default mode (required by backward
compatibility).
rows are filled before columns
This mode is enabled by option -x, --fillrows
table
Determine the number of columns the input contains and create
a table. This mode is enabled by option -t, --table and
columns formatting is possible to modify by --table-*
options. Use this mode if not sure. The output is aligned to
the terminal width in interactive mode and the 80 columns in
non-interactive mode (see --output-width for more details).
Input is taken from file, or otherwise from standard input. Empty
lines are ignored and all invalid multibyte sequences are encoded
by x<hex> convention.
The argument columns for --table-* options is a comma separated
list of the column names as defined by --table-columns, or names
defined by --table-column or it’s column number in order as
specified by input. It’s possible to mix names and numbers. The
special placeholder '0' (e.g. -R0) may be used to specify all
columns and '-1' (e.g. -R -1) to specify the last visible column.
It’s possible to use ranges like '1-5' when addressing columns by
numbers.
-J, --json
Use JSON output format to print the table, the option
--table-columns is required and the option --table-name is
recommended.
-c, --output-width width
Output is formatted to a width specified as number of
characters. The original name of this option is --columns;
this name is deprecated since v2.30. Note that input longer
than width is not truncated by default. The default is a
terminal width and the 80 columns in non-interactive mode.
The column headers are never truncated.
The placeholder "unlimited" (or 0) is possible to use to not
restrict output width. This is recommended for example when
output to the files rather than on terminal.
-d, --table-noheadings
Do not print header. This option allows the use of logical
column names on the command line, but keeps the header hidden
when printing the table.
-o, --output-separator string
Specify the columns delimiter for table output (default is
two spaces).
-s, --separator separators
Specify the possible input item delimiters (default is
whitespace).
-t, --table
Determine the number of columns the input contains and create
a table. Columns are delimited with whitespace, by default,
or with the characters supplied using the --output-separator
option. Table output is useful for pretty-printing.
-C, --table-column properties
Define one column by comma separated list of column
attributes. This option can be used more than once, every use
defines just one column. The properties replace some of
--table- options. For example --table-column name=FOO,right
define one column where text is aligned to right. The option
is mutually exclusive to --table-columns.
The currently supported attributes are:
name=string
Specifies column name.
trunc
The column text can be truncated when necessary. The same
as --table-truncate.
right
Right align text in the specified columns. The same as
--table-right.
width=number
Specifies column width. The width is used as a hint only.
The width is strictly followed only when strictwidth
attribute is used too.
strictwidth
Strictly follow column width= setting.
noextreme
Specify columns where is possible to ignore unusually
long cells. See --table-noextreme for more details.
wrap
Specify columns where is possible to use multi-line cell
for long text when necessary. See --table-wrap.
hide
Don’t print specified columns. See --table-hide.
json=type
Define column type for JSON output, Supported are string,
number and boolean.
-N, --table-columns names
Specify the columns names by comma separated list of names.
The names are used for the table header or to address column
in option argument. See also --table-column.
-l, --table-columns-limit number
Specify maximal number of the input columns. The last column
will contain all remaining line data if the limit is smaller
than the number of the columns in the input data.
-R, --table-right columns
Right align text in the specified columns.
-T, --table-truncate columns
Specify columns where text can be truncated when necessary,
otherwise very long table entries may be printed on multiple
lines.
-E, --table-noextreme columns
Specify columns where is possible to ignore unusually long
(longer than average) cells when calculate column width. The
option has impact to the width calculation and table
formatting, but the printed text is not affected.
The option is used for the last visible column by default.
-e, --table-header-repeat
Print header line for each page.
-W, --table-wrap columns
Specify columns where is possible to use multi-line cell for
long text when necessary.
-H, --table-hide columns
Don’t print specified columns. The special placeholder '-'
may be used to hide all unnamed columns (see
--table-columns).
-O, --table-order columns
Specify columns order on output.
-n, --table-name name
Specify the table name used for JSON output. The default is
"table".
-m, --table-maxout
Fill all available space on output.
-L, --keep-empty-lines
Preserve whitespace-only lines in the input. The default is
ignore empty lines at all. This option’s original name was
--table-empty-lines but is now deprecated because it gives
the false impression that the option only applies to table
mode.
-r, --tree column
Specify column to use tree-like output. Note that the
circular dependencies and other anomalies in child and parent
relation are silently ignored.
-i, --tree-id column
Specify column with line ID to create child-parent relation.
-p, --tree-parent column
Specify column with parent ID to create child-parent
relation.
-x, --fillrows
Fill rows before filling columns.
-h, --help
Display help text and exit.
-V, --version
Print version and exit.
The environment variable COLUMNS is used to determine the size of
the screen if no other information is available.
The column command appeared in 4.3BSD-Reno.
Version 2.23 changed the -s option to be non-greedy, for example:
printf "a:b:c\n1::3\n" | column -t -s ':'
Old output:
a b c
1 3
New output (since util-linux 2.23):
a b c
1 3
Historical versions of this tool indicated that "rows are filled
before columns" by default, and that the -x option reverses this.
This wording did not reflect the actual behavior, and it has
since been corrected (see above). Other implementations of column
may continue to use the older documentation, but the behavior
should be identical in any case.
Print fstab with header line and align number to the right:
sed 's/#.*//' /etc/fstab | column --table --table-columns SOURCE,TARGET,TYPE,OPTIONS,FREQ,PASS --table-right FREQ,PASS
Print fstab and hide unnamed columns:
sed 's/#.*//' /etc/fstab | column --table --table-columns SOURCE,TARGET,TYPE --table-hide -
Print a tree:
echo -e '1 0 A\n2 1 AA\n3 1 AB\n4 2 AAA\n5 2 AAB' | column --tree-id 1 --tree-parent 2 --tree 3
1 0 A
2 1 |-AA
4 2 | |-AAA
5 2 | `-AAB
3 1 `-AB
colrm(1), ls(1), paste(1), sort(1)
For bug reports, use the issue tracker at
https://github.com/util-linux/util-linux/issues.
The column command is part of the util-linux package which can be
downloaded from Linux Kernel Archive
<https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/>. This page
is part of the util-linux (a random collection of Linux
utilities) project. Information about the project can be found at
⟨https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/⟩. If you have
a bug report for this manual page, send it to
util-linux@vger.kernel.org. This page was obtained from the
project's upstream Git repository
⟨git://git.kernel.org/pub/scm/utils/util-linux/util-linux.git⟩ on
2024-06-14. (At that time, the date of the most recent commit
that was found in the repository was 2024-06-10.) If you discover
any rendering problems in this HTML version of the page, or you
believe there is a better or more up-to-date source for the page,
or you have corrections or improvements to the information in
this COLOPHON (which is not part of the original manual page),
send a mail to man-pages@man7.org
util-linux 2.41.devel-537-e... 2024-06-13 COLUMN(1)
Pages that refer to this page: colrm(1)
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HTML rendering created 2024-06-26 by Michael Kerrisk, author of The Linux Programming Interface. For details of in-depth Linux/UNIX system programming training courses that I teach, look here. Hosting by jambit GmbH. |
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