cut (Unix)

cut
Original authorAT&T Bell Laboratories
DevelopersVarious open-source and commercial developers
Initial releaseFebruary 1985 (1985-02)
Operating systemUnix, Unix-like, IBM i
PlatformCross-platform
TypeCommand
Licensecoreutils: GPLv3+

cut is a shell command that extracts sections from each line of input text — usually from a file. Extraction of line segments can typically be done by bytes (-b), characters (-c), or fields (-f) separated by a delimiter (-d — the tab character by default). A range must be provided in each case which consists of one of N, N-M, N- (N to the end of the line), or -M (beginning of the line to M), where N and M are counted from 1 (there is no zeroth value). Since version 6, an error is thrown if you include a zeroth value. Prior to this the value was ignored and assumed to be 1.