Open System Services Shell and Utilities Reference Manual (G06.28+, H06.05+)

User Commands (t - u) tail(1)
+[number][unit]
(Obsolescent) Begins writing from a location that is the specified number of units after
the beginning of the input file.
The default value for number is 10.
The possible values for unit are:
b Specifies 512-byte blocks
c Specifies characters, counted byte by byte
k Specifies 1-kilobyte blocks
l Specifies lines
m Specifies characters, counting a multibyte character as a single charac-
ter
The default value for unit is l.
-[number][unit][f]
(Obsolescent) Begins writing from a location that is the specified number of units
before the end of the input file.
The default value for number is 10.
The possible values for unit are:
b Specifies 512-byte blocks
c Specifies characters, counted byte by byte
k Specifies 1-kilobyte blocks
l Specifies lines
m Specifies characters, counting a multibyte character as a single charac-
ter
The default value for unit is l. Specifying f has the same effect as specifying the -f flag.
DESCRIPTION
The tail command writes from the named file (or, if no file is specified, from the standard input
file) to the standard output file, beginning at a point you specify. If you do not specify the flags -
f, -r, -number,or+number, tail begins reading 10 lines before the end of the file. - (end of input
file) is the default starting point, l (lines) is the default unit, and 10 is the default number.
By specifying +, you can direct tail to write from the beginning of the input file. By specifying a
number or a unit or both, you can change the point at which tail begins writing.
The unit argument can specify lines, blocks, or characters. The block size is either 512 bytes or 1
kilobyte.
Environment Variables
This command supports the use of the LANG, LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE, LC_MESSAGES, and
NLSPATH environment variables.
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