Editing Wc (Unix)

{{Short description|Unix command utility}}
{{lowercase}}
{{Infobox software
| name                   = wc
| logo                   = 
| screenshot             = Wc-unix.png
| screenshot size        = 
| caption                = The {{code|wc}} command
| author                 = [[Joe Ossanna]]<br />([[AT&T Bell Laboratories]])
| developer              = Various [[open-source software|open-source]] and [[commercial software|commercial]] developers
| released               = {{Start date and age|1971|11|3}}
| latest release version = 
| latest release date    = 
| programming language   = [[C (programming language)|C]]
| operating system       = [[Unix]], [[Unix-like]], [[V (operating system)|V]], [[Plan 9 from Bell Labs|Plan 9]], [[Inferno (operating system)|Inferno]], [[MSX-DOS]], [[IBM i]]
| platform               = [[Cross-platform]]
| genre                  = [[Command (computing)|Command]]
| license                = Plan 9, Inferno: [[MIT License|MIT]]<br />[[coreutils]]: [[GPL-3.0-or-later]]
| website                = 
}}
'''{{code|wc}}''' (short for '''w'''ord '''c'''ount) is a command in [[Unix]], [[Plan 9 from Bell Labs|Plan 9]], [[Inferno (operating system)|Inferno]], and [[Unix-like]] [[operating system]]s. The program reads either [[standard input]] or a list of [[computer file]]s and generates one or more of the following statistics: [[newline]] count, [[word count]], and [[byte]] count. If a list of files is provided, both individual file and total statistics follow.

==Example==
Sample execution of '''wc''':

<syntaxhighlight lang="console">
 $ wc foo bar
      40     149     947 foo
    2294   16638   97724 bar
    2334   16787   98671 total
</syntaxhighlight>

The first column is the count of newlines, meaning that the text file <code>foo</code> has 40 newlines while <code>bar</code> has 2294 newlines- resulting in a total of 2334 newlines. The second column indicates the number of words in each text file showing that there are 149 words in <code>foo</code> and 16638 words in <code>bar</code>{{snd}} giving a total of 16787 words. The last column indicates the number of characters in each text file, meaning that the file <code>foo</code> has 947 characters while <code>bar</code> has 97724 characters{{snd}} 98671 characters all in all.

Newer versions of <code>wc</code> can differentiate between [[byte]] and [[character (computing)|character]] count. This difference arises with [[Unicode]] which includes multi-byte characters. The desired behaviour is selected with the <code>-c</code> or <code>-m</code> options.

Through a [[Pipeline (Unix)|pipeline]], it can also be used to preview the output size of a command with a potentially large output, without it printing the text into the console:
<syntaxhighlight lang=console>
$ grep -r "example" |wc
    1071   23337  101349
</syntaxhighlight>

==History==
{{code|wc}} is part of the [[X/Open]] Portability Guide since issue 2 of 1987. It was inherited into the first version of [[POSIX|POSIX.1]] and the [[Single Unix Specification]].<ref>{{man|cu|wc|SUS}}</ref> It appeared in [[Ancient UNIX|Version 1 Unix]].<ref>{{man|1|wc|FreeBSD}}</ref>

[[GNU]] <code>wc</code> used to be part of the GNU [[textutils]] package; it is now part of GNU [[coreutils]]. The version of <code>wc</code> bundled in GNU coreutils was written by Paul Rubin and David MacKenzie.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://linux.die.net/man/1/wc |title = wc(1) - Linux man page}}</ref>

A <code>wc</code> command is also part of [[ASCII Corporation|ASCII]]'s ''MSX-DOS2 Tools'' for [[MSX-DOS]] version 2.<ref>[https://archive.org/details/MSXDOS2TOOLS MSX-DOS2 Tools User's Manual by ASCII Corporation]</ref>

The command is available as a separate package for [[Microsoft Windows]] as part of the [[GnuWin32]] project<ref>[http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/packages/coreutils.htm CoreUtils for Windows]</ref> and the [[UnxUtils]] collection of [[Native (computing)|native]] [[Windows API|Win32]] [[porting|ports]] of common GNU Unix-like utilities.<ref>[http://unxutils.sourceforge.net/ Native Win32 ports of some GNU utilities]</ref>

The {{Mono|wc}} command has also been ported to the [[IBM i]] operating system.<ref>{{cite web |title=IBM System i Version 7.2 Programming Qshell |language=en |author=IBM |website=[[IBM]] |author-link=IBM |url=https://www.ibm.com/support/knowledgecenter/ssw_ibm_i_74/rzahz/rzahzpdf.pdf?view=kc |access-date=2020-09-05 }}</ref>

==Usage==
*<code>wc -c <filename></code> prints the byte count
*<code>wc -l <filename></code> prints the line count
*<code>wc -m <filename></code> prints the character count
*<code>wc -w <filename></code> prints the word count
*<code>wc -L <filename></code> prints the length of the longest line (GNU extension)

==See also==
*[[List of Unix commands]]

==References==
{{Reflist}}

==External links==
{{Wikibooks|Guide to Unix|Commands}}
*[http://man.cat-v.org/unix-1st/1/wc wc(1) - Original Unix First Edition manual page for wc].
*{{man|1|wc|die.net}}
*{{man|1|wc|Plan 9}}
*{{man|1|wc|Inferno}}
*[http://www.linfo.org/wc.html The <code>wc</code> Command] by The Linux Information Project (LINFO)

{{Unix commands}}
{{Plan 9 commands}}
{{Core Utilities commands}}

[[Category:Unix text processing utilities]]
[[Category:Unix SUS2008 utilities]]
[[Category:Plan 9 commands]]
[[Category:Inferno (operating system) commands]]
[[Category:IBM i Qshell commands]]