NAME
expand, unexpand
— expand tabs to spaces, and
vice versa
SYNOPSIS
expand |
[-t tabstop]
[-t tab1,tab2,...,tabn]
[file ...] |
unexpand |
[-a] [-t
tab1,tab2,...,tabn] [file
...] |
DESCRIPTION
expand processes the named files or the standard input
writing the standard output with tabs changed into blanks. Backspace
characters are preserved into the output and decrement the column count for
tab calculations. expand is useful for pre-processing
character files (before sorting, looking at specific columns, etc.) that
contain tabs.
If a single tabstop argument is given, then tabs are set tabstop spaces apart instead of the default 8. If multiple tabstops are given then the tabs are set at those specific columns.
unexpand puts tabs back into the data from
the standard input or the named files and writes the result on the standard
output.
Option (with unexpand only):
-a- By default, only leading blanks and tabs are reconverted to maximal
strings of tabs. If the
-aoption is given, then tabs are inserted whenever they would compress the resultant file by replacing two or more characters.
HISTORY
The expand command appeared in
1BSD.