43.10 Filename Headers Above Files Without pr

The pr command ( 43.7 ) displays your files with a nice header above them. But it can also add a bunch of blank lines to fill a page and break the file to add more headers in the middle if the file is longer than a page. This article shows alternatives to pr that print a single header followed by the entire file, with no extra blank lines or page breaks.

1. When you redirect the output of more ( 25.3 ) (or pg ) somewhere besides a terminal, it doesn't stop at the end of a screenful. It prints a little header above each file and outputs all the files at once. Instead of redirecting the output to a file, you could pipe it to another program - like your print spooler:

   cat	% more file* > package % cat package :::::::::::::: file1 :::::::::::::: ...contents of file1.... :::::::::::::: file2 :::::::::::::: ...contents of file2.... ...

   Another way to get similar headers is a feature of head ( 25.20 ) : when you give multiple filenames, it adds a header above each. To be sure head gives you all of your file (not just the head), use a line count bigger than any of your files, with a command like head -10000 .

2. Bourne shell for loops with redirected output ( 45.22 ) let you combine a bunch of commands and grab the output of all of them at once. Here's a loop that runs ls -l on each file. It uses awk ( 33.11 ) to print just the file's permissions (field 1), last modification date (fields 6-8), and name (field 9, not including any name from a symbolic link). (You could pipe use more awk formatting to make a fancier heading - and get rid of the echo commands, too.) The output is redirected to a file named printme ; as already stated, a pipe to your printer program will also work.

   $ 
   
   for f in file*
   
    > 
   
   do
   
    > 
   
   echo =====================================
   
    > 
   
   ls -l $f | awk '{print $1, $6, $7, $8, $9}'
   
    > 
   
   echo =====================================
   
    > 
   
   cat $f
   
    > 
   
   done > printme
   
    $ 
   
   cat printme
   
    ============================================= -rw-r----- Oct 28 07:28 
   
   file1
   
    ============================================= 
   ...contents of file1....
    ============================================= -r--r--r-- Nov  3 09:35 
   
   file2
   
    ============================================= 
   ...contents of file2....
    ...

If you use those last two tricks a lot, you might put them into an alias, function, or shell script ( 10.1 ) .