LAM(1) General Commands Manual LAM(1)
NAME
lam — laminate files
SYNOPSIS
lam [−F|f min.max] [−P|p min.max] [−S|s sepstring] [−T|t c] file ...
DESCRIPTION
lam copies the named files side by side onto the standard output. The n-th input lines from the input files are considered fragments of the single long n-th output line into which they are assembled. The name “-” means the standard input, and may be repeated.
The options are as follows:
−F|f min.max
Print line fragments according to the format string min.max, where min is the minimum field width and max the maximum field width. If min begins with a zero, zeros will be prepended to make up the field width instead of blanks, and if it begins with a ‘-’, the fragment will be left-adjusted within the field.
If −f is used, it affects only the file after it; if −F is used, it affects all subsequent files until it appears again uncapitalized.
−P|p min.max
Like −f, but pad this file’s field when end-of-file is reached and other files are still active.
If −p is used, it affects only the file after it; if −P is used, it affects all subsequent files until it appears again uncapitalized.
−S|s sepstring
Print sepstring before printing line fragments from the next file. This option may appear after the last file.
If −s is used, it affects only the file after it; if −S is used, it affects all subsequent files until it appears again uncapitalized.
−T|t c
The input line terminator is c instead of a newline. The newline normally appended to each output line is omitted.
If −t is used, it affects only the file after it; if −T is used, it affects all subsequent files until it appears again uncapitalized.
To print files simultaneously for easy viewing use pr(1).
ENVIRONMENT
LC_CTYPE
The character encoding locale(1). It determines the display widths of characters used by the −f and −p options. If unset or set to "C", "POSIX", or an unsupported value, each byte is regarded as a character of display width 1.
EXAMPLES
Join four files together along each line:
$ lam file1 file2 file3 file4
Merge the lines from four different files:
$ lam file1
−S "\
" file2 file3 file4
Join every two lines of a file:
$ lam − − < file
A form letter with substitutions keyed by ‘@’ can be done with:
$ lam −t @ letter changes
SEE ALSO
join(1), pr(1), printf(1)
HISTORY
The lam utility first appeared in 4.2BSD.
AUTHORS
John A. Kunze GNU December 2, 2021 LAM(1)