misc-utils/look.1

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  32 .\"     @(#)look.1      8.1 (Berkeley) 6/14/93
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  34 .TH LOOK 1 "June 2011" "util-linux" "User Commands"
  35 .SH NAME
  36 look \- display lines beginning with a given string
  37 .SH SYNOPSIS
  38 .B look
  39 .RI [ options ] " string " [ file ]
  40 .SH DESCRIPTION
  41 The
  42 .B look
  43 utility displays any lines in
  44 .I file
  45 which contain
  46 .IR string .
  47 As
  48 .B look
  49 performs a binary search, the lines in
  50 .I file
  51 must be sorted (where sort(1) got the same options
  52 .BR "\-d " and/or " \-f " that
  53 .B look
  54 is invoked with).
  55 .PP
  56 If
  57 .I file
  58 is not specified, the file
  59 .I /usr/share/dict/words
  60 is used, only alphanumeric characters are compared and the case of
  61 alphabetic characters is ignored.
  62 .SH OPTIONS
  63 .TP
  64 .BR \-a , " \-\-alternative"
  65 Use the alternative dictionary file.
  66 .TP
  67 .BR \-d , " \-\-alphanum"
  68 Use normal dictionary character set and order, i.e. only alphanumeric characters
  69 are compared.  (This is on by default if no file is specified.)
  70 .TP
  71 .BR \-f , " \-\-ignore\-case"
  72 Ignore the case of alphabetic characters.  (This is on by default if no file is
  73 specified.)
  74 .TP
  75 .BR \-t , " \-\-terminate " \fIcharacter\fR
  76 Specify a string termination character, i.e. only the characters
  77 in \fIstring\fR up to and including the first occurrence of \fIcharacter\fR
  78 are compared.
  79 .TP
  80 .BR \-h , " \-\-help"
  81 Display help text and exit.
  82 .TP
  83 .BR \-V , " \-\-version"
  84 Output version information and exit.
  85 .PP
  86 The
  87 .B look
  88 utility exits 0 if one or more lines were found and displayed, 1 if
  89 no lines were found, and >1 if an error occurred.
  90 .SH EXAMPLE
  91 .RS
  92 .nf
  93 sort -d /etc/passwd -o /tmp/look.dict
  94 look -t: root:foobar /tmp/look.dict
  95 .nf
  96 .RE
  97 .SH FILES
  98 .IX Header "FILES"
  99 .IP "\fB/usr/share/dict/words\fR" 4
 100 the dictionary
 101 .IP "\fB/usr/share/dict/web2\fR" 4
 102 the alternative dictionary
 103 .SH "SEE ALSO"
 104 .BR grep (1),
 105 .BR sort (1)
 106 .SH COMPATIBILITY
 107 The original manual page stated that tabs and blank characters participated
 108 in comparisons when the alphanum option was specified.  This was incorrect,
 109 and the current man page matches the historic implementation.
 110 .SH HISTORY
 111 The
 112 .B look
 113 utility appeared in Version 7 AT&T Unix.
 114 .SH AVAILABILITY
 115 The look command is part of the util-linux package and is available from
 116 ftp://ftp.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/.