Go2Linux | Linux Operating System

Uniq

is a Linux Operating System command, that removes successive repeated lines in its output.

So if the input is a file that has repetitive lines, all of them will be removed but one, only if they are successive.

To assure that all repetitive lines are removed, the file needs to be sorted first.

The format of the file is:

uniq [options] [input-file] [output-file]

If no imput-file is specified, the input is taken from the standard input, also, if no outpu-file is specified the output is send to the standard output.

Its Options are:

-c, --count

prefix lines by the number of occurrences

-d, --repeated

only print duplicate lines

-D, --all-repeated[=delimit-method]

print all duplicate lines delimit-method={none(default),prepend,separate} Delimiting is done with blank lines

-f, --skip-fields=N

avoid comparing the first N fields

-i, --ignore-case

ignore differences in case when comparing

-s, --skip-chars=N

avoid comparing the first N characters

-u, --unique

only print unique lines

-z, --zero-terminated

end lines with 0 byte, not newline

-w, --check-chars=N

compare no more than N characters in lines

--help

display this help and exit

--version

output version information and exit

Examples

Given the file test.txt with this inside.

blue baloon
blue baloon
blue baloon
red baloon
red baloon
green baloon
green baloon
green baloon

uniq test.txt

blue baloon
red baloon
green baloon

Now let's count how many lines of each occurence there are:

uniq -c test.txt

Using the -c or --count modifier, you will have each line with the count os occurences of that particular line. Like this:

3 blue baloon
2 red baloon
3 green baloon