1CSPLIT(1P) POSIX Programmer's Manual CSPLIT(1P)
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6 This manual page is part of the POSIX Programmer's Manual. The Linux
7 implementation of this interface may differ (consult the corresponding
8 Linux manual page for details of Linux behavior), or the interface may
9 not be implemented on Linux.
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12 csplit — split files based on context
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15 csplit [-ks] [-f prefix] [-n number] file arg...
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18 The csplit utility shall read the file named by the file operand, write
19 all or part of that file into other files as directed by the arg oper‐
20 ands, and write the sizes of the files.
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23 The csplit utility shall conform to the Base Definitions volume of
24 POSIX.1‐2017, Section 12.2, Utility Syntax Guidelines.
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26 The following options shall be supported:
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28 -f prefix Name the created files prefix00, prefix01, ..., prefixn. The
29 default is xx00 ... xxn. If the prefix argument would cre‐
30 ate a filename exceeding {NAME_MAX} bytes, an error shall
31 result, csplit shall exit with a diagnostic message, and no
32 files shall be created.
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34 -k Leave previously created files intact. By default, csplit
35 shall remove created files if an error occurs.
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37 -n number Use number decimal digits to form filenames for the file
38 pieces. The default shall be 2.
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40 -s Suppress the output of file size messages.
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43 The following operands shall be supported:
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45 file The pathname of a text file to be split. If file is '-', the
46 standard input shall be used.
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48 Each arg operand can be one of the following:
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50 /rexp/[offset]
51 A file shall be created using the content of the lines from
52 the current line up to, but not including, the line that
53 results from the evaluation of the regular expression with
54 offset, if any, applied. The regular expression rexp shall
55 follow the rules for basic regular expressions described in
56 the Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2017, Section 9.3,
57 Basic Regular Expressions. The application shall use the
58 sequence "\/" to specify a <slash> character within the rexp.
59 The optional offset shall be a positive or negative integer
60 value representing a number of lines. A positive integer
61 value can be preceded by '+'. If the selection of lines from
62 an offset expression of this type would create a file with
63 zero lines, or one with greater than the number of lines left
64 in the input file, the results are unspecified. After the
65 section is created, the current line shall be set to the line
66 that results from the evaluation of the regular expression
67 with any offset applied. If the current line is the first
68 line in the file and a regular expression operation has not
69 yet been performed, the pattern match of rexp shall be
70 applied from the current line to the end of the file. Other‐
71 wise, the pattern match of rexp shall be applied from the
72 line following the current line to the end of the file.
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74 %rexp%[offset]
75 Equivalent to /rexp/[offset], except that no file shall be
76 created for the selected section of the input file. The
77 application shall use the sequence "\%" to specify a <per‐
78 cent-sign> character within the rexp.
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80 line_no Create a file from the current line up to (but not including)
81 the line number line_no. Lines in the file shall be numbered
82 starting at one. The current line becomes line_no.
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84 {num} Repeat operand. This operand can follow any of the operands
85 described previously. If it follows a rexp type operand, that
86 operand shall be applied num more times. If it follows a
87 line_no operand, the file shall be split every line_no lines,
88 num times, from that point.
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90 An error shall be reported if an operand does not reference a line
91 between the current position and the end of the file.
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94 See the INPUT FILES section.
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97 The input file shall be a text file.
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100 The following environment variables shall affect the execution of
101 csplit:
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103 LANG Provide a default value for the internationalization vari‐
104 ables that are unset or null. (See the Base Definitions vol‐
105 ume of POSIX.1‐2017, Section 8.2, Internationalization Vari‐
106 ables for the precedence of internationalization variables
107 used to determine the values of locale categories.)
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109 LC_ALL If set to a non-empty string value, override the values of
110 all the other internationalization variables.
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112 LC_COLLATE
113 Determine the locale for the behavior of ranges, equivalence
114 classes, and multi-character collating elements within regu‐
115 lar expressions.
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117 LC_CTYPE Determine the locale for the interpretation of sequences of
118 bytes of text data as characters (for example, single-byte as
119 opposed to multi-byte characters in arguments and input
120 files) and the behavior of character classes within regular
121 expressions.
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123 LC_MESSAGES
124 Determine the locale that should be used to affect the format
125 and contents of diagnostic messages written to standard
126 error.
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128 NLSPATH Determine the location of message catalogs for the processing
129 of LC_MESSAGES.
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132 If the -k option is specified, created files shall be retained. Other‐
133 wise, the default action occurs.
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136 Unless the -s option is used, the standard output shall consist of one
137 line per file created, with a format as follows:
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140 "%d\n", <file size in bytes>
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143 The standard error shall be used only for diagnostic messages.
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146 The output files shall contain portions of the original input file;
147 otherwise, unchanged.
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150 None.
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153 The following exit values shall be returned:
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155 0 Successful completion.
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157 >0 An error occurred.
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160 By default, created files shall be removed if an error occurs. When the
161 -k option is specified, created files shall not be removed if an error
162 occurs.
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164 The following sections are informative.
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167 None.
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170 1. This example creates four files, cobol00 ... cobol03:
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173 csplit -f cobol file '/procedure division/' /par5./ /par16./
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175 After editing the split files, they can be recombined as follows:
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178 cat cobol0[0-3] > file
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180 Note that this example overwrites the original file.
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182 2. This example would split the file after the first 99 lines, and
183 every 100 lines thereafter, up to 9999 lines; this is because lines
184 in the file are numbered from 1 rather than zero, for historical
185 reasons:
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188 csplit -k file 100 {99}
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190 3. Assuming that prog.c follows the C-language coding convention of
191 ending routines with a '}' at the beginning of the line, this exam‐
192 ple creates a file containing each separate C routine (up to 21) in
193 prog.c:
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196 csplit -k prog.c '%main(%' '/^}/+1' {20}
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199 The -n option was added to extend the range of filenames that could be
200 handled.
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202 Consideration was given to adding a -a flag to use the alphabetic file‐
203 name generation used by the historical split utility, but the function‐
204 ality added by the -n option was deemed to make alphabetic naming
205 unnecessary.
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208 None.
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211 sed, split
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213 The Base Definitions volume of POSIX.1‐2017, Chapter 8, Environment
214 Variables, Section 9.3, Basic Regular Expressions, Section 12.2, Util‐
215 ity Syntax Guidelines
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218 Portions of this text are reprinted and reproduced in electronic form
219 from IEEE Std 1003.1-2017, Standard for Information Technology -- Por‐
220 table Operating System Interface (POSIX), The Open Group Base Specifi‐
221 cations Issue 7, 2018 Edition, Copyright (C) 2018 by the Institute of
222 Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Inc and The Open Group. In the
223 event of any discrepancy between this version and the original IEEE and
224 The Open Group Standard, the original IEEE and The Open Group Standard
225 is the referee document. The original Standard can be obtained online
226 at http://www.opengroup.org/unix/online.html .
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228 Any typographical or formatting errors that appear in this page are
229 most likely to have been introduced during the conversion of the source
230 files to man page format. To report such errors, see https://www.ker‐
231 nel.org/doc/man-pages/reporting_bugs.html .
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235IEEE/The Open Group 2017 CSPLIT(1P)