more(1)more(1)NAME
more, page - Displays a file one screenful at a time
SYNOPSIS
Current Syntax
more [-cdeflhiprsuvwz] [-lines] [-n number] [+line_number | | [-t
tagstring] +/pattern] [file...]
page [-cdefhiprsuvz] [-n number] [+line_number | +/pattern] [-t
tagstring] [file...]
Obsolescent Syntax
more [-cdefhipsuvz] [-number] [+G] [+line_number | +/pattern] [-t
tagstring] [file...]
page [-cdefhipsuvz] [-number] [+G] [+line_number | +/pattern] [-t
tagstring] [file...]
The more command invokes a filter that allows examination of continuous
text, one screenful at a time, on a soft-copy terminal.
[Tru64 UNIX] The page command is equivalent to more, but erases the
screen before displaying each screenful.
STANDARDS
Interfaces documented on this reference page conform to industry stan‐
dards as follows:
more: XCU5.0
Refer to the standards(5) reference page for more information about
industry standards and associated tags.
OPTIONS
Starts each screenful at the top of the screen and erases existing out‐
put on each line before displaying a new line. This avoids scrolling
the screen, making it easier to read while more is writing. It is also
faster than scrolling on many terminals. This option is ignored if the
terminal does not have the ability to clear to the end of a line. This
option does not work with -h. [Tru64 UNIX] Prompts you to continue,
quit, or obtain help after each screenful of text. Exits immediately
after writing the last line of the last file in the argument list.
[Tru64 UNIX] Counts logical lines rather than screen lines; that is,
long lines are not folded. This option is recommended if nroff output
is piped through ul, or if more reads any text that contains escape
sequences. Escape sequences contain characters that would ordinarily
occupy screen positions, but which do not print when they are sent to
the terminal as part of an escape sequences. Thus more may think that
lines are longer than they actually are, and fold lines erroneously.
[Tru64 UNIX] Help mode. Perform pattern matching in searches without
regard to case. [SVR4] Ignore the use of ASCII Form Feed characters
(^D) as page breaks. more clears the screen before displaying a file
that begins with a Form Feed character.
The default is to honor the use of ASCII Form Feed characters as
page breaks. Specifies the number of lines per screenful. The
number argument is a positive decimal integer. The -n option
overrides any values obtained from the environment. For each
file examined, initially execute the more command in the command
argument. If the command is a positioning command, such as a
line number or a regular expression search, set the current
position to represent the final results of the command, without
writing any intermediate lines of the file. For example, the
two commands: more -p 1000j file
more -p 1000G file
would be equivalent and start the display with the current posi‐
tion at line 1000, bypassing the lines that j would write and
scroll off the screen if it had been issued during the file
examination. If the positioning command is unsuccessful, the
first line in the file will be the current position. [Tru64
UNIX] Ignores most control characters that it does not inter‐
pret in some way. Control characters that are not understood
are displayed as ^C where C represents any such character.
Squeezes multiple empty lines from the output, producing only
one empty line. Especially helpful when viewing nroff output,
this option maximizes the amount of useful information present
on the screen. Suppresses processing of underlined text for
terminal display. Normally, more handles underlining in a man‐
ner appropriate to the particular terminal: if the terminal can
perform underlining or has a highlight mode, more outputs appro‐
priate escape sequences to enable underlining or highlight mode
for underlined information in the source file. Write the
screenful of the file containing the tag named by the tagstring
argument. See the ctags(1) reference page. [Tru64 UNIX] Does
not display nonprinting characters graphically. Without this
option, all non-ASCII and control characters (except <Tab>,
<Backspace>, and <Return>) are displayed visibly in the form ^X
for <Ctrl-x>, or M-x for non-ASCII character x. [SVR4] Prompts
and waits for a subcommand after the displayed text is shown.
The default behavior is to exit at the end of the displayed text
automatically. [Tru64 UNIX] Same as if the -v option is not
given, but in addition, <Backspace> is displayed as ^H, <Return>
as ^M, and <Tab> as ^I. [Tru64 UNIX] Starts up at line_number.
[Tru64 UNIX] Starts up at the last screenful in the file. This
gives you an opportunity to scroll or page backward through the
file. Starts up at the line containing the regular expression
pattern. [Tru64 UNIX] Sets the number of lines in the display
window to number. The default is two lines less than the number
of lines displayed by the terminal; on a screen that displays 24
lines, the default is 22.
DESCRIPTION
The more utility reads files and either writes them to the terminal on
a page-by-page basis or filters them to standard output. If standard
output is not a terminal device, all input files are copied to standard
output in their entirety, without modification. If standard output is
a terminal device, the files are displayed (one screenful) at a time
under the control of user commands. The more command pauses when it
encounters a page break (embedded ^L) in text.
The number of lines available per screen is determined by the -n
option, if specified, or by examining values in the environment (see
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES). If neither method yields a number, an unspeci‐
fied number of lines is displayed. The actual number of lines written
is one less than this number, as the last line of the screen is used to
display a user prompt and user input. If the number of lines available
per screen is less than four, the results are undefined.
If the terminal type can be determined, the more command looks in the
terminfo database to determine terminal characteristics, and to deter‐
mine the default window size. On a terminal capable of displaying 24
lines, the default window size is 22 lines.
If the program is invoked as page, then the screen is cleared before
each screenful is printed (but only if a full screenful is being
printed), and k minus 1 rather than k minus 2 lines are printed in each
screenful, where k is the number of lines the terminal can display.
SUBCOMMANDS
The more command provides the following subcommands that you can type
when more pauses. These commands are designed to be similar to the
commands supported by the vi editor; (i is an optional integer argu‐
ment, defaulting to 1.) Regular expressions (as referred to here) are
described under grep. All three forms display i more lines. Displays
i more lines, or another screenful if i is not specified. Scrolls one-
half screen forward (displays the next k/2 lines, where k is the number
of lines displayed by the <Space> command). If i is specified, then
the scroll size is set to i. Same as <Ctrl-d>. Scrolls one-half
screen backward. If i is specified, then the scroll size is set to i.
Note that if your line kill character is <Ctrl-u>, then you must use
the u command to scroll backward. Same as <Ctrl-u>. Scroll back i
lines. Same as <Ctrl-y>. Displays i more lines. Goes to line i and
displays a screenful, making line i the top line on the screen. If i
is not specified, then more displays the first screenful in the file.
Skips i screenfuls and prints a screenful. Skips i lines and prints a
screenful. Skips back i screenfuls and prints a screenful. Same as b.
Exits from more. Displays the current line number. Starts up the vi
editor at the current line. Displays a description of all the more
subcommands. Searches for the ith occurrence of the regular expression
expression. If there are less than i occurrences of expression, and
the input is a file rather than a pipe, then the position in the file
remains unchanged. Otherwise, a screenful is displayed, starting with
the line matching expression. You can use Erase and Kill characters to
edit the regular expression, which must be terminated by pressing
<Return> (with no trailing / character). Erasing back past the first
column cancels the search command. If expression is null, more uses
the last regular expression entered. Same as /, but searches backward
in the file. Searches for the ith occurrence of the last regular
expression entered. Searches for the ith occurrence of the last regu‐
lar expression entered, but reverses the direction of that search.
Returns to the point from which the last search started. If no search
was performed in the current file, returns to the beginning of the
file. Invokes a shell with command. The % (percent sign) and !
(exclamation point) characters in command are replaced with the current
file name and the previous shell command, respectively. If there is no
current file name, % is not expanded. The sequences \% and \! are
replaced by % and !, respectively. Skips to the ith next file speci‐
fied in the command line. Skips to the ith previous file given in the
command line. If this command is given during display of a file, more
returns to the beginning of the file. If more is not reading from a
file, the bell is rung and nothing else happens. Displays the current
file name and line number. Exits from more (same as q or Q). Repeats
the previous command. Redraws the screen. Displays help information.
The commands take effect immediately; it is not necessary to type a
carriage-return. Up to the time when the command character itself is
given, you can enter the line Kill character to cancel the numerical
argument being formed. In addition, you can enter the Erase character
to redisplay the prompt.
At any time when output is being sent to the terminal, you can press q.
The more command stops sending output, and displays the usual prompt.
You can then enter one of the preceding commands in the normal manner.
Some output is lost when this is done, due to the fact that any charac‐
ters waiting in the terminal's output queue are flushed when the QUIT
signal occurs.
The terminal is set to noecho mode by this program so that the output
can be continuous. Thus, subcommands you enter do not show on your
terminal, except for the / (slash), ? (question mark), and ! (excla‐
mation point) commands.
EXIT STATUS
The following exit values are returned: Successful completion. An
error occurred.
INPUT FILES
The input files being examined must be text files. If standard output
is a terminal, standard error is used to read commands from the user.
If standard output is a terminal, standard error is not readable, and
command input is needed, more terminates with an error indicating that
it was unable to read user commands. If standard output is not a ter‐
minal, no error results if standard error cannot be opened for reading.
EXAMPLES
The following is a sample use of more in previewing nroff output: nroff
-ms doc.n | more -s -f
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
[Tru64 UNIX] Normally, you place the command sequence that sets up the
environment variables in the files. Setting them in or will prevent
possibly unnecessary reevaluation of the variable assignments. Since
it is unlikely that you will ever want to remotely execute more (for
example, rsh <host> more), it is not as important to place them in the
files.
The following environment variables affect the execution of more: Over‐
rides the system-selected horizontal screen size. Used by the v sub‐
command to select an editor. If this variable is unset, the editor is
/usr/bin/vi. Provides a default value for the internationalization
variables that are unset or null. If LANG is unset or null, the corre‐
sponding value from the default locale is used. If any of the interna‐
tionalization variables contain an invalid setting, the utility behaves
as if none of the variables had been defined. If set to a non-empty
string value, overrides the values of all the other internationaliza‐
tion variables. Determines the locale for the interpretation of
sequences of bytes of text data as characters (for example, single-byte
as opposed to multibyte characters in arguments) and the behavior of
character classes in regular expressions.. Determines the locale for
the format and contents of diagnostic messages written to standard
error. Determines the location of message catalogues for the process‐
ing of LC_MESSAGES. The LINES variable overrides the system-selected
vertical screen size, used as the number of lines in a screenful. The
-n option takes precedence over the LINES variable for determining the
number of lines in a screenful. The more command looks in the MORE
environment variable to preset any desired options; for example, assume
that you prefer to view files using the -c and -e options. The csh com‐
mand setenv MORE -c -e, or the ksh or sh command sequence MORE='-c -e'
; export MORE would cause all invocations of more, including invoca‐
tions by programs such as man and mesg, to use this mode.
The MORE variable no longer supports options without hyphens.
It only supports white space separated hyphenated variables. Any
command-line options are processed after those in the MORE vari‐
able, as if the command line were: more $MORE options operands
The TERM variable determines the name of the terminal type.
FILES
Terminal information database.
SEE ALSO
Commands: cat(1), csh(1), ctags(1), grep(1), ksh(1), man(1), nroff(1),
pg(1), script(1), Bourne shell sh(1b), POSIX shell sh(1p), ul(1)
Files: terminfo(4)
Standards: standards(5)more(1)
