SORT(1)							  SORT(1)

NAME
       sort - sort or merge files

SYNOPSIS
       sort [ -_________x ] [ +pos1  [ -pos2 ] ] ...  [ -o name ]
       [ -T directory ] [ name ] ...

DESCRIPTION
       Sort 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.

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

       b    Ignore leading blanks (spaces and tabs) in field com-
	    parisons.

       d    `Dictionary'  order:  only letters, digits and blanks
	    are significant in comparisons.

       f    Fold upper case letters onto lower case.

       i    Ignore characters outside the ASCII range 040-0176 in
	    nonnumeric comparisons.

       n    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.  Option n implies option b.

       r    Reverse the sense of comparisons.

       tx   `Tab character' separating fields is x.

       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 flags bdfinr, where m tells a number of fields
       to skip from the beginning of the line and n tells a  num-
       ber  of characters to skip further.  If any flags are pre-
       sent 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	 indepen-
       dently  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

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SORT(1)							  SORT(1)

       otherwise compare equal are ordered with all bytes signif-
       icant.

       These option arguments are also understood:

       c    Check  that the input file is sorted according to the
	    ordering rules; give no output unless the file is out
	    of sort.

       m    Merge only, the input files are already sorted.

       o    The	 next  argument	 is the name of an output file to
	    use instead of the standard output.	 This file may be
	    the same as one of the inputs.

       T    The next argument is the name of a directory in which
	    temporary files should be made.

       u    Suppress all but one in  each  set	of  equal  lines.
	    Ignored  bytes and bytes outside keys do not partici-
	    pate 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 (passwd(5)) sorted by user id num-
       ber (the 3rd colon-separated 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 represen-
       tative from a set of equal lines predictable.

	       sort -um +0 -1 dates

FILES
       /usr/tmp/stm*, /tmp/*: first and second tries  for  tempo-
       rary files

SEE ALSO
       uniq(1), comm(1), rev(1), join(1)

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

BUGS
       Very long lines are silently truncated.

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