DevOps in Linux — od Command
<p>The <code>od</code> command in Linux stands for "octal dump". This command allows you to display the contents of a file or input in various formats including <code>octal</code>, <code>decimal</code>, <code>hexadecimal</code>, and more. It's often used for debugging, to analyze and verify the exact contents of a file, particularly in cases when the file might not contain human-readable text.</p>
<p>For example:</p>
<pre>
$ od test.txt
0000000 062564 072163 000012
0000005</pre>
<p>The above command displays the contents of <code>test.txt</code> in octal format by default. However, you can specify a different format using various options. For instance, to display the contents in hexadecimal:</p>
<pre>
$ od -x test.txt
0000000 6574 7473 000a
0000005</pre>
<p><code>od</code> is part of the core set of utilities that are essential and standard on Unix and Unix-like operating systems, including Linux distributions.</p>
<p>The initial purpose of <code>od</code> was to provide a way to dump the contents of a file in octal (base 8) format, which was useful for debugging and analysis purposes, particularly when dealing with non-text files. Since its inception, <code>od</code> has been expanded to support many more data formats, including hexadecimal, decimal, and character outputs, making it even more versatile for inspecting and understanding the content of files.</p>
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