NAME

col − column alignment

SYNOPSIS

­col [ ­-bfx ]

DESCRIPTION

­Col overlays lines to expunge reverse line feeds (ESC-7) and half line feeds (ESC-9 and ESC-8) as produced by ­nroff for .2C in ms(6) or man(6) and for tbl(1). ­Col is a pure filter.  It normally emits only full line feeds; option ­-f (fine) allows half line feeds too.  Option ­-b removes backspaces, printing just one of each pile of overstruck characters.  ­Col normally converts white space to tabs; option ­-x overrides this feature.  Other escaped characters and non-printing characters are ignored. 

EXAMPLES

tbl file | nroff -ms | col | p
Format some tables for printing on typewriters; use ­col to remove reverse line feeds, and paginate the output. 

SEE ALSO

pr(1)

BUGS

­Col can’t back up more than 128 lines or handle more than 800 characters per line, and understands ­VT (013) as reverse line feed. 

Plan 9  —  December 02, 2007