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Reading Text Files from the Console


Notes:

cat is an extremely versatile tool. Check out http://www-106.ibm.com/developerworks/linux/library/l-tiptex2.html for a few examples of creative “cat” usage.

tuxfiles.org also has a cat/less reference page.

less has been christened this way as a mockery of “more”, a traditional UNIX file viewer. The problem with “more” is that it could only increment the screen by a full page down the document. No going back up, no line-by-line scroll. So someone decided to scratch his itch, and write a better "more".