PR(1)

💅 pr — PR(1) General Commands Manual 💅

🌸 NAME 🌸

pr — paginate or columnate FILE(s) for printing. That’s literally the whole main-character job, bestie: get those files print-ready and cute. 💖

✨ SYNOPSIS ✨

pr [OPTION]... [FILE]...

🦋 DESCRIPTION 🦋

Okay so pr paginates or columnates FILE(s) for printing. It takes your input and formats it for the printer, periodt. ✨

🎀 OPTIONS 🎀

• --pages <FIRST_PAGE[:LAST_PAGE]> — This is your print range, bestie: begin at page FIRST_PAGE and stop at page LAST_PAGE, using the FIRST_PAGE[:LAST_PAGE] shape. 💖
• -h, --header <STRING> — Use the string header to replace the file name in the header line — that’s the <STRING> you pass, slay. 🎀
• -D, --date-format <FORMAT> — Use a date-style FORMAT for the header date. 🗓️
• -d, --double-space — Double-spaced output, periodt: an extra <newline> character is output following every <newline> found in the input. 😭 double the newlines, double the drama.
• -n, --number-lines [<[char][width]>] — Give lines width-digit numbering. If width isn’t specified, the default is 5. The number occupies the first width column positions of each text column or each line of -m output. If char (any non-digit character) is given, it is appended to the line number to separate it from whatever follows. The default for char is a <tab>. Line numbers longer than width columns are truncated. 💅
• -N, --first-line-number <NUMBER> — Start counting with NUMBER at the 1st line of the first page printed. 🔢
• -t, --omit-header — Write neither the five-line identifying header nor the five-line trailer usually supplied for each page. Quit writing after the last line of each file without spacing to the end of the page. 💀 no header, no trailer, no extra page spacing.
• -T, --omit-pagination — Omit page headers and trailers, and eliminate any pagination by form feeds set in input files. 🌈
• -l, --length <PAGE_LENGTH> — Override the 66-line default (the default number of lines of text is 56, and with -F it’s 63) and reset the page length to lines. If lines is not greater than the sum of both the header and trailer depths (in lines), pr shall suppress both the header and trailer, as if the -t option were in effect. ⚠️ tiny page lengths can eat your header/trailer, so read that twice.
• -r, --no-file-warnings — Omit the warning when a file cannot be opened. 🙈
• -F, --form-feed — Use a <form-feed> for new pages, instead of the default behavior that uses a sequence of <newline>s. 🧚
• -w, --width <width> — Set the width of the line to width column positions for multiple text-column output only. If -w is not specified and -s is not specified, the default width shall be 72. If -w is not specified and -s is specified, the default width shall be 512. 📏
• -W, --page-width <width> — Set page width to PAGE_WIDTH (72) characters always, truncate lines, except when the -J option is set, with no interference with -S or -s. 🔥
• -a, --across — Modify the effect of the - column option so the columns are filled across the page in a round-robin order. Example: when column is 2, the first input line heads column 1, the second heads column 2, the third is the second line in column 1, and so on. 🌀
• --columns <columns> — Produce multi-column output arranged in columns columns (the default shall be 1) and written down each column in the order the text is received from the input file. This option should not be used with -m. The options -e and -i shall be assumed for multiple text-column output. Whether or not text columns are produced with identical vertical lengths is unspecified, but a text column shall never exceed the length of the page (see the -l option). When used with -t, use the minimum number of lines to write the output. 🫶
• -s, --separator [<char>] — Separate text columns by the single character char instead of by the appropriate number of <space>s (the default for char is the <tab> character). 🍓
• -S, --sep-string [<string>] — Separate columns by STRING. Without -S, the default separator is <TAB> with -J and <space> otherwise (same as -S\" \"), and there is no effect on column options. 🎀
• -m, --merge — Merge files. Standard output shall be formatted so the pr utility writes one line from each file specified by a file operand, side by side into text columns of equal fixed widths, in terms of the number of column positions. Implementations shall support merging of at least nine file operands. 👑
• -o, --indent <margin> — Each line of output shall be preceded by offset <space>s. If -o is not specified, the default offset shall be zero. The space taken is in addition to the output line width (see the -w option below). 🌸
• -J, --join-lines — Merge full lines, turns off -W line truncation, no column alignment, and --sep-string[=STRING] sets separators. 🔗
• --help — Print help information. 💖
• -e, --expand-tabs <[CHAR][WIDTH]> — Expand input CHARs (TABs) to tab WIDTH (8). ✨
• -V, --version — Print version. 🎀
• [files] [default: -] — The file operands, defaulting to -. 💅

🌈 EXTRA 🌈

If no FILE(s) are given, or if FILE is -, read standard input. 💖

When creating multicolumn output, columns will be of equal width. When using the -s option to separate columns, the default separator is a single tab character. When using the -S option to separate columns, the default separator is a single space character. 🦋

👑 VERSION 👑

The version is v(uutils coreutils) 0.12.0. Slay. 💅

💖 Cute little sign-off: this page is from source/version v(uutils coreutils) 0.12.0, dated 2026-09-17. Stay paginated, bestie! 💖