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Q&A What unexpected things can happen if a user runs commands expecting a text file on input lacking a file-final newline?

I’ve had some tools drop the last incomplete line on some OSes. For example: $ printf 'foo\nbar\nbaz' | sed 's/x/y/' foo bar $ _ I don’t recall which systems exactly these were, but I know ...

posted 13d ago by mirabilos‭

Answer
#1: Initial revision by user avatar mirabilos‭ · 2024-05-07T20:40:24Z (13 days ago)
I’ve had some tools drop the last incomplete line on some OSes.

For example:

    $ printf 'foo\nbar\nbaz' | sed 's/x/y/'
    foo
    bar
    $ _

I don’t recall which systems exactly these were, but I know I ran into it multiple times over the years, and POSIX allows this (I checked, it’s the application’s/user’s duty to provide the final newline).