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## 3.3.7 Looking at files

The commands `more` and `cat` are used for viewing the contents of files. `more` displays a file, one screenful at a time, while `cat` displays the whole file at once.

To look at the file `shells`, we can use the command

`/home/larry/foo# more shells`

In case you're interested what `shells` contains, it's a list of valid shell programs on your system. On most systems, this includes `/bin/sh`, `/bin/bash`, and `/bin/csh`. We'll talk about these different types of shells later.

While using `more`, press to display the next page of text, and to display the previous page. There are other commands available in `more` as well, these are just the basics. Pressing will quit `more`.

Quit `more` and try `cat /etc/termcap`. The text will probably fly by much too quickly for you to read it. The name ```cat`'' actually stands for ``concatenate'', which is the real use of the program. The `cat` command can be used to concatenate the contents of several files and save the result to another file. This will be discussed later.

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