Command: cat - concatenate files and write them to stdout Syntax: cat [-u] [file] ... Flags: -u Unbuffered output Examples: cat file # Display file on the terminal cat file1 file2 | lpr # Concatenate 2 files and print result Cat concatenates its input files and copies the result to stdout. If no input file is named, or - is encountered as a file name, standard input is used. Output is buffered in 512 byte blocks unless the -u flag is given. If you just want to copy a file, cp should be used since it is faster.