SEQ(1)                      General Commands Manual                     SEQ(1)

NAME
     seq – print sequences of numbers

SYNOPSIS
     seq [-w] [-f format] [-s string] [-t string] [first [incr]] last

DESCRIPTION
     The seq utility prints a sequence of numbers, one per line (default),
     from first (default 1), to near last as possible, in increments of incr
     (default 1).  When first is larger than last, the default incr is -1.

     All numbers are interpreted as floating point.

     Normally integer values are printed as decimal integers.

     The seq utility accepts the following options:

     -f format, --format format
                   Use a printf(3) style format to print each number.  Only
                   the A, a, E, e, F, f, G, g, and % conversion characters are
                   valid, along with any optional flags and an optional
                   numeric minimum field width or precision.  The format can
                   contain character escape sequences in backslash notation as
                   defined in ANSI X3.159-1989 (“ANSI C89”).  The default is
                   %g.

     -s string, --separator string
                   Use string to separate numbers.  The string can contain
                   character escape sequences in backslash notation as defined
                   in ANSI X3.159-1989 (“ANSI C89”).  The default is \n.

     -t string, --terminator string
                   Use string to terminate sequence of numbers.  The string
                   can contain character escape sequences in backslash
                   notation as defined in ANSI X3.159-1989 (“ANSI C89”).  This
                   option is useful when the default separator does not
                   contain a \n.

     -w, --fixed-width
                   Equalize the widths of all numbers by padding with zeros as
                   necessary.  This option has no effect with the -f option.
                   If any sequence numbers will be printed in exponential
                   notation, the default conversion is changed to %e.

EXIT STATUS
     The seq utility exits 0 on success, and >0 if an error occurs.

EXAMPLES
     Generate a sequence from 1 to 3 (included) with a default increment of 1:

           # seq 1 3
           1
           2
           3

     Generate a sequence from 3 to 1 (included) with a default increment of
     -1:

           # seq 3 1
           3
           2
           1

     Generate a sequence from 0 to 0.1 (included) with an increment of 0.05
     and padding with leading zeroes.

           # seq -w 0 .05 .1
           0.00
           0.05
           0.10

     Generate a sequence from 1 to 3 (included) with a default increment of 1,
     a custom separator string and a custom terminator:

           # seq -s "-->" -t "[end of list]\n" 1 3
           1-->2-->3-->[end of list]

     Generate a sequence from 1 to 2 (included) with an increment of 0.2 and
     print the results with two digits after the decimal point (using a
     printf(3) style format):

           # seq -f %.2f 1 0.2 2
           1.00
           1.20
           1.40
           1.60
           1.80
           2.00

SEE ALSO
     jot(1), printf(1), printf(3)

HISTORY
     The seq command first appeared in Version 8 AT&T UNIX.  A seq command
     appeared in NetBSD 3.0, and was ported to FreeBSD 9.0.  This command was
     based on the command of the same name in Plan 9 from Bell Labs and the
     GNU core utilities.  The GNU seq command first appeared in the 1.13 shell
     utilities release.

BUGS
     The -w option does not handle the transition from pure floating point to
     exponent representation very well.  The seq command is not bug for bug
     compatible with other implementations.

macOS 15.0                       June 20, 2020                      macOS 15.0