comm(1)                                                             comm(1)




 NAME    [Toc]    [Back]
      comm - select or reject lines common to two sorted files

 SYNOPSIS    [Toc]    [Back]
      comm [-[123]] file1 file2

 DESCRIPTION    [Toc]    [Back]
      comm reads file1 and file2, which should be ordered in increasing
      collating sequence (see sort(1) and Environment Variables below), and
      produces a three-column output:

           Column 1:   Lines that appear only in file1,
           Column 2:   Lines that appear only in file2,
           Column 3:   Lines that appear in both files.

      If - is used for file1 or file2, the standard input is used.

      Options 1, 2, or 3 suppress printing of the corresponding column.
      Thus comm -12 prints only the lines common to the two files; comm -23
      prints only lines in the first file but not in the second; comm -123
      does nothing useful.

 EXTERNAL INFLUENCES    [Toc]    [Back]
    Environment Variables
      LC_COLLATE determines the collating sequence comm expects from the
      input files.

      LC_MESSAGES determines the language in which messages are displayed.

      If LC_MESSAGES is not specified in the environment or is set to the
      empty string, the value of LANG determines the language in which
      messages are displayed.  If LC_COLLATE is not specified in the
      environment or is set to the empty string, the value of LANG is used
      as a default.  If LANG is not specified or is set to the empty string,
      a default of ``C'' (see lang(5)) is used instead of LANG.  If any
      internationalization variable contains an invalid setting, comm
      behaves as if all internationalization variables are set to ``C''.
      See environ(5).

    International Code Set Support    [Toc]    [Back]
      Single- and multi-byte character code sets are supported.

 EXAMPLES    [Toc]    [Back]
      The following examples assume that file1 and file2 have been ordered
      in the collating sequence defined by the LC_COLLATE or LANG
      environment variable.

      Print all lines common to file1 and file2 (in other words, print
      column 3):





 Hewlett-Packard Company            - 1 -   HP-UX 11i Version 2: August 2003






 comm(1)                                                             comm(1)




           comm -12 file1 file2

      Print all lines that appear in file1 but not in file2 (in other words,
      print column 1):

           comm -23 file1 file2

      Print all lines that appear in file2 but not in file1 (in other words,
      print column 2):

           comm -13 file1 file2

 SEE ALSO    [Toc]    [Back]
      cmp(1), diff(1), sdiff(1), sort(1), uniq(1).

 STANDARDS CONFORMANCE    [Toc]    [Back]
      comm: SVID2, SVID3, XPG2, XPG3, XPG4, POSIX.2


 Hewlett-Packard Company            - 2 -   HP-UX 11i Version 2: August 2003