SUM(1)

📦 version 1.053, in alpine 3.24

✨ NAME ✨

Hiii bestie!! You're looking at SUM(1), aka the sum page from User Contributed Perl Documentation — and yes, she's iconic. 💅

sum — display file checksums and block counts

🦋 SYNOPSIS 🦋

sum [-a alg] [-o 1|2] [file ...]

💖 DESCRIPTION 💖

Okay so sum outputs three space separated values: file checksum, file size, and file name. The output can be useful for indicating errors in transmitted files. 🫶

🚨 bestie warning: you should not use sum for security checks as they are easily fooled. No cap, do not trust it with your life.

If no file names are specified, the standard input will be used. ✨

🎀 OPTIONS 🎀

  • -a blake224 — BLAKE/224 algorithm (requires Digest::BLAKE) 💖
  • -a blake256 — BLAKE/256 algorithm (requires Digest::BLAKE) 💖
  • -a blake384 — BLAKE/384 algorithm (requires Digest::BLAKE) 💖
  • -a blake512 — BLAKE/512 algorithm (requires Digest::BLAKE) 💖
  • -a crc — CRC32 algorithm ✨
  • -a jh224 — JH/224 algorithm (requires Digest::JH) 🦋
  • -a jh256 — JH/256 algorithm (requires Digest::JH) 🦋
  • -a jh384 — JH/384 algorithm (requires Digest::JH) 🦋
  • -a jh512 — JH/512 algorithm (requires Digest::JH) 🦋
  • -a haval256 — Haval256 algorithm (requires Digest::Haval256) 🌸
  • -a md2 — MD2 algorithm (requires Digest::MD2) 🎀
  • -a md4 — MD4 algorithm (requires Digest::MD4) 🎀
  • -a md5 — MD5 algorithm 🎀
  • -a sha1 — SHA-1 algorithm ⭐
  • -a sha224 — SHA-2/256 algorithm ⭐
  • -a sha256 — SHA-2/256 algorithm ⭐
  • -a sha384 — SHA-2/384 algorithm ⭐
  • -a sha512 — SHA-2/512 algorithm ⭐
  • -a sha3-224 — SHA-3/224 algorithm (requires Digest::SHA3) 🌈
  • -a sha3-256 — SHA-3/256 algorithm (requires Digest::SHA3) 🌈
  • -a sha3-384 — SHA-3/384 algorithm (requires Digest::SHA3) 🌈
  • -a sha3-512 — SHA-3/512 algorithm (requires Digest::SHA3) 🌈
  • -a whirlpool — Whirlpool algorithm (requires Digest::Whirlpool) 🌀
  • -o 1 — Historic BSD algorithm 🕰️
  • -o 2 — Historic SYSV algorithm 🕰️

🧚 NOTES 🧚

sum returns 0 on success or 1 if an error occurred. 👑

If the program was executed as "cksum" the default algorithm is CRC32, otherwise the default algorithm is BSD. 💅

The BSD and SYSV algorithms round up to the next block count for partial blocks. ✨

The CRC32 algorithm was ported directly from OpenBSD cksum C source code. 🧚

🌈 HISTORY 🌈

Perl version rewritten for the Perl Power Tools project from the description of the cksum program in OpenBSD. 🦋

👑 AUTHOR 👑

Theo Van Dinter (felicity@kluge.net) 💌

🌸 SEE ALSO 🌸

md5sum(1) — go give her a lil visit too 💖

okay that's the whole page!! mwah 💋 — this lovely little manual is from perl v5.42.2, dated 2026-02-15. bye bestie!! 🫶✨

📦 where this page comes from