Name

nl — number lines of files

Synopsis

nl [OPTION...] [FILE...]

DESCRIPTION

Write each FILE to standard output, with line numbers added.

With no FILE, or when FILE is −, read standard input.

Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short options too.

−b, −−body−numbering=STYLE/

use STYLE for numbering body lines

−d, −−section−delimiter=CC/

use CC for logical page delimiters

−f, −−footer−numbering=STYLE/

use STYLE for numbering footer lines

−h, −−header−numbering=STYLE/

use STYLE for numbering header lines

−i, −−line−increment=NUMBER/

line number increment at each line

−l, −−join−blank−lines=NUMBER/

group of NUMBER empty lines counted as one

−n, −−number−format=FORMAT/

insert line numbers according to FORMAT

−p, −−no−renumber

do not reset line numbers for each section

−s, −−number−separator=STRING/

add STRING after (possible) line number

−v, −−starting−line−number=NUMBER/

first line number for each section

−w, −−number−width=NUMBER/

use NUMBER columns for line numbers

−−help

display this help and exit

−−version

output version information and exit

Default options are: −bt −d'\:' −fn −hn −i1 −l1 −n'rn' −s<TAB> −v1 −w6

CC are two delimiter characters used to construct logical page delimiters; a missing second character implies ':'. As a GNU extension one can specify more than two characters, and also specifying the empty string (−d '') disables section matching.

STYLE is one of:

a

number all lines

t

number only nonempty lines

n

number no lines

pBRE

number only lines that contain a match for the basic regular expression, BRE

FORMAT is one of:

ln

left justified, no leading zeros

rn

right justified, no leading zeros

rz

right justified, leading zeros

AUTHOR

Written by Scott Bartram and David MacKenzie.

REPORTING BUGS

GNU coreutils online help: <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>

Report any translation bugs to <https://translationproject.org/team/>

SEE ALSO

Full documentation <https://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/nl>

or available locally via: info '(coreutils) nl invocation'

COPYRIGHT

Copyright © 2022 Free Software Foundation, Inc. License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <https://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.

This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it. There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.