Here is extension of the question: How do I limit the number of files printed by ls?
with additional condition: how to print results in as many columns as fit to the current terminal width — as ls does by default.
I understand how to limit number of files by head command but I have not come up with the solution on how to print files in columns in the same way as ls does by default but after processing through pipe.
I tried ls -C flag (from man ls: -C list entries by columns) with piping to cat. But its output differs from ls out:
for i in {1..30}; do touch file$i; done; echo '"ls" out:'; ls; echo '"ls -C | cat" out:'; ls -C | cat
"ls" out:
file1 file11 file13 file15 file17 file19 file20 file22 file24 file26 file28 file3 file4 file6 file8
file10 file12 file14 file16 file18 file2 file21 file23 file25 file27 file29 file30 file5 file7 file9
"ls -C | cat" out:
file1 file12 file15 file18 file20 file23 file26 file29 file4 file7
file10 file13 file16 file19 file21 file24 file27 file3 file5 file8
file11 file14 file17 file2 file22 file25 file28 file30 file6 file9
“ls” out gives 2 line. And “ls -C | cat” out gives 3 lines. Does this may be ls -C bug?
I tried column command. But when file with longer name is present it gives different result than ls.
mv file30 file-with-long-name; ls
file1 file11 file13 file15 file17 file19 file20 file22 file24 file26 file28 file3 file5 file7 file9
file10 file12 file14 file16 file18 file2 file21 file23 file25 file27 file29 file4 file6 file8 file-with-long-name
ls | cat | column -c $(tput cols)
file1 file14 file19 file23 file28 file6
file10 file15 file2 file24 file29 file7
file11 file16 file20 file25 file3 file8
file12 file17 file21 file26 file4 file9
file13 file18 file22 file27 file5 file-with-long-name
ls gives 2 lines. And ls | cat | column -c $(tput cols) gives 5 lines.
tput cols — calculates terminal width.
Is there may be alternative to column that will not format all columns width according to the longest file name, but will do this like ls does?
Is there may be alternative command to ls to achieve such printing with limiting max file numbers? (But I also would like to have similar to ls files coloring.)