Passes the output of previous command to next one, or to shell. This is a method of chaining commands together. If one of the commands in the pipe aborts, this prematurely terminates execution of the pipe. This will forcibly overwrite an existing file. White space functions as a separator, separating commands or variables.
White space consists of either spaces, tabs, blank lines, or any combination thereof.
In some contexts, such as variable assignment, white space is not permitted, and results in a syntax error. Blank lines Blank lines have no effect on the action of a script, and are therefore useful for visually separating functional sections of the script. In general, I recommend using the more portable idiom, especially in cases like these where it is not much more work to use it. I would think poorly of an IT developer at our company if I saw him or her writing scripts like this, because they usually indicate unfamiliarity with shells besides bash. Create an account.