suse man page for tail

TAIL(1) 							   User Commands							   TAIL(1)

NAME
       tail - output the last part of files

SYNOPSIS
       tail [OPTION]... [FILE]...

DESCRIPTION
       Print  the  last 10 lines of each FILE to standard output.  With more than one FILE, precede each with a header giving the file name.  With
       no FILE, or when FILE is -, read standard input.

       Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short options too.

       -c, --bytes=N
	      output the last N bytes; alternatively, use +N to output bytes starting with the Nth of each file

       -f, --follow[={name|descriptor}]
	      output appended data as the file grows; -f, --follow, and --follow=descriptor are equivalent

       -F     same as --follow=name --retry

       -n, --lines=N
	      output the last N lines, instead of the last 10; or use +N to output lines starting with the Nth

       --max-unchanged-stats=N
	      with --follow=name, reopen a FILE which has not changed size after N (default 5) iterations to  see  if  it  has	been  unlinked	or
	      renamed (this is the usual case of rotated log files)

       --pid=PID
	      with -f, terminate after process ID, PID dies

       -q, --quiet, --silent
	      never output headers giving file names

       --retry
	      keep trying to open a file even when it is or becomes inaccessible; useful when following by name, i.e., with --follow=name

       -s, --sleep-interval=S
	      with -f, sleep for approximately S seconds (default 1.0) between iterations

       -v, --verbose
	      always output headers giving file names

       --help display this help and exit

       --version
	      output version information and exit

       If  the first character of N (the number of bytes or lines) is a `+', print beginning with the Nth item from the start of each file, other-
       wise, print the last N items in the file.  N may have a multiplier suffix:  b  512,  kB	1000,  K  1024,  MB  1000*1000,  M  1024*1024,	GB
       1000*1000*1000, G 1024*1024*1024, and so on for T, P, E, Z, Y.

       With  --follow (-f), tail defaults to following the file descriptor, which means that even if a tail'ed file is renamed, tail will continue
       to track its end.  This default behavior is not desirable when you really want to track the actual name of the file, not the file  descrip-
       tor (e.g., log rotation).  Use --follow=name in that case.  That causes tail to track the named file by reopening it periodically to see if
       it has been removed and recreated by some other program.

AUTHOR
       Written by Paul Rubin, David MacKenzie, Ian Lance Taylor, and Jim Meyering.

REPORTING BUGS
       Report tail bugs to bug-coreutils@gnu.org
       GNU coreutils home page: <http://www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/>
       General help using GNU software: <http://www.gnu.org/gethelp/>

COPYRIGHT
       Copyright (C) 2009 Free Software Foundation, Inc.  License GPLv3+: GNU GPL version 3 or later <http://gnu.org/licenses/gpl.html>.
       This is free software: you are free to change and redistribute it.  There is NO WARRANTY, to the extent permitted by law.

SEE ALSO
       The full documentation for tail is maintained as a Texinfo manual.  If the info and tail programs are properly installed at your site,  the
       command

	      info coreutils 'tail invocation'

       should give you access to the complete manual.

GNU coreutils 7.1						     July 2010								   TAIL(1)