The Tale of Tail (Unix Command)
Posted on 06. Mar, 2008 by Sajith M.R in linux
The most interesting and useful command i ever used is tail in unix. As the name indicate its duty is to show the last lines of a particular file. When take the case of log files such as error logs, always we have to know the last lines or last updations instead of reading from top to bottom or search a full text file.
for its option try this tail –help
tail -n 10 error.log
shows last 10 lines of error.log
The very interesting option is -f , means open the file and follow the last lines.
This is very useful for debugging purpose. For example if you want to check error.log lively, use this option
tail -f error.log
it displays last lines and also automatically updates when any changes happens in error.log file. So you can check other operation by tailing and following a particular file .
Try today itself. You will be very much interested, thats my guarantee 
(There is also a similar function ‘head’, you can guess what its use, google it for more)
Regards
Sajith
Anoop P Alias
Mar 6th, 2008
A very good option of tail is
tail -f file
This will follow the file and update any updates at the end of the file.Good if you want to watch last entries being updated on a log file
Christopher
Jul 5th, 2009
This is really good for me, as I want to watch last entries being updated on a log file!
Thanks!!!