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10 .TH CMP 1 "Jul 19, 2006"
12 cmp \- compare two files
16 \fBcmp\fR [\fB-l\fR | \fB-s\fR] \fIfile1\fR \fIfile2\fR [\fIskip1\fR] [\fIskip2\fR]
22 The \fBcmp\fR utility compares two files. \fBcmp\fR writes no output if the
23 files are the same. Under default options, if they differ, it writes to
24 standard output the byte and line numbers at which the first difference
25 occurred. Bytes and lines are numbered beginning with 1. If one file is an
26 initial subsequence of the other, that fact is noted. \fIskip1\fR and
27 \fIskip2\fR are initial byte offsets into \fIfile1\fR and \fIfile2\fR
28 respectively, and can be either octal or decimal. A leading 0 denotes octal.
32 The following options are supported:
39 Write the byte number (decimal) and the differing bytes (octal) for each
49 Write nothing for differing files. Return exit status only.
55 The following operands are supported:
62 A path name of the first file to be compared. If \fIfile1\fR is \fB\(mi\fR, the
63 standard input is used.
72 A path name of the second file to be compared. If \fIfile2\fR is \fB\(mi\fR,
73 the standard input is used.
78 If both \fIfile1\fR and \fIfile2\fR refer to standard input or refer to the
79 same \fBFIFO\fR special, block special or character special file, an error
84 See \fBlargefile\fR(5) for the description of the behavior of \fBcmp\fR when
85 encountering files greater than or equal to 2 Gbyte (2^31 bytes).
88 \fBExample 1 \fRComparing Files Byte for Byte
91 The following example does a byte for byte comparison of \fIfile1\fR and
97 example% \fBcmp file1 file2 0 1024\fR
104 It skips the first 1024 bytes in \fIfile2\fR before starting the comparison.
106 .SH ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
109 See \fBenviron\fR(5) for descriptions of the following environment variables
110 that affect the execution of \fBcmp\fR: \fBLANG\fR, \fBLC_ALL\fR,
111 \fBLC_CTYPE\fR, \fBLC_MESSAGES\fR, and \fBNLSPATH\fR.
115 The following error values are returned:
122 The files are identical.
131 The files are different. This includes the case where one file is identical to
132 the first part of the other.
147 See \fBattributes\fR(5) for descriptions of the following attributes:
155 ATTRIBUTE TYPE ATTRIBUTE VALUE
159 Interface Stability Standard
165 \fBcomm\fR(1), \fBdiff\fR(1), \fBattributes\fR(5), \fBenviron\fR(5),
166 \fBlargefile\fR(5), \fBstandards\fR(5)