COLUMN(1) COLUMN(1)
NAME
col, 2-6, mc, fold, expand - column alignment
SYNOPSIS
col [ -bfx ]
2 [ file ]
ind [ prefix ]
fold [ -N ] [ file ] ...
mc [ - ] [ -N ] [ -t ] [ file ] ...
expand [ -stops ] [ file ] ...
DESCRIPTION
These programs rearrange files for appearance's sake. All
read the standard input and write the standard output. Some
optionally read from files instead.
Col overlays lines to expunge reverse line feeds (ESC-7) and
half line feeds (ESC-9 and ESC-8) as produced by nroff for
.2C in ms(7) and for tbl(1). It normally emits only full
line feeds; option -f (fine) allows half line feeds too.
Option -b removes backspaces, printing just one of each pile
of overstruck characters. Col normally converts white space
to tabs; option -x overrides this feature. Other escaped
characters and non-printing characters, except for SO and
SI, are ignored.
Col should not be used for printing on an HP ThinkJet
printer with think(9.1), which performs the col function
itself.
Commands 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 convert their input to 2-, 3-, 4-,
5-, or 6-column form.
Mc prints in as many columns as will fit on N-column `paper'
(default n=80). If an input line ends in a colon `:', a
`break' occurs; thus `ls directory1 directory2 | mc' lists
each directory separately. This feature is suppressed if
option - is present, or if input is from a file. On output,
multiple spaces are converted to tabs; this is suppressed by
option -t.
Expand replaces tabs by spaces. The optional stops argument
is a comma-separated of tab stop postions, counted from 0;
default is every 8 columns.
COLUMN(1) COLUMN(1)
Fold inserts newlines after each N characters (default n=80)
of long lines.
EXAMPLE
tbl file | nroff -ms | col | hp
FILES
/etc/termcap
SEE ALSO
pr(1)
BUGS
Col can't back up more than 128 lines or handle more than
800 characters per line, and understands VT (013) as reverse
line feed.