The cut command in UNIX or Linux is used to select sections of text from each line of files. It is used to select fields or columns from a line by specifying a delimiter or to select a portion of text by specify the range or characters. Basically the cut command slices a line and extracts the text.
The most commonly used options in cut commands are as follows.
Option Description
-c Cuts the input file using list of characters specified by this option
-f Cuts the input file using list of field. The default field to be used TAB.
-d Specifies a delimiter to use as a field. As mentioned previously default field is TAB and this option overwrites this default behaviour.
In the following cut command examples