GNU Core Utilities

GNU Core Utilities
Developer(s)	GNU Project
Stable release	9.7 / 9 April 2025
Repository	git.savannah.gnu.org/cgit/coreutils.git ;
Written in	C, shell script
Operating system	Unix-like
Type	Miscellaneous utilities
License	2007: GPL-3.0-or-later; 2002: GPL-2.0-or-later
Website	www.gnu.org/software/coreutils/

The GNU Core Utilities or coreutils is a collection of GNU software that implements many standard, Unix-based shell commands. See list. The utilities generally provide POSIX compliant interface when the POSIXLY_CORRECT environment variable is set, but otherwise offers a superset to the standard interface. For example, the utilities support long options and options after parameters. This environment variable enables a different functionality in BSD.

Similar collections are available in the FOSS ecosystem, with a slightly different scope and focus (less functionality), or license. For example, BusyBox which is licensed under GPL-2.0-only, and Toybox which is licensed under 0BSD.

History

In 1990, David MacKenzie announced GNU fileutils.^[3]

In 1991, MacKenzie announced GNU shellutils and GNU textutils.^[4]^[5] Moreover, Jim Meyering became the maintainer of the packages (known now as coreutils) and has remained so since.^[6]

In September 2002, the GNU coreutils were created by merging the earlier packages textutils, shellutils, and fileutils, along with some other miscellaneous utilities.^[7]

In July 2007, the license of the GNU coreutils was updated from GPL-2.0-or-later to GPL-3.0-or-later.^[8]

Notes

^ GPL-3.0-or-later since version 6.10.
^ GPL-2.0-or-later until version 6.9.

References

^ Pádraig Brady (9 April 2025). "coreutils-9.7 released [stable]". Retrieved 9 April 2025.
^ "The GNU Core Utilities Open Source Project on Open Hub: Languages Page". Archived from the original on 2019-03-28. Retrieved 2019-03-28.
^ "GNU file utilities release 1.0". groups.google.com.
^ "GNU shell programming utilities released". groups.google.com.
^ "new GNU file and text utilities released". groups.google.com.
^ "GNU's Who".
^ Meyering, Jim (2003-01-13). "README-package-renamed-to-coreutils". Archived from the original on 2019-12-25. Retrieved 2018-08-15.
^ Meyering, Jim (2007-07-23). "COPYING: Update to Version 3". Archived from the original on 2019-12-25. Retrieved 2018-08-15.

External links

Official website
The Heirloom Toolchest - An alternative set of utilities
opensource.com article: gnu-core-utilities on 4 Apr 2018 by David Both (Correspondent)

[3] GPL-3.0-or-later since version 6.10.

[4] GPL-2.0-or-later until version 6.9.

[wikidata-159b59e800f29beac91a97aa5eccaeaaf22dea06-v18-1] Pádraig Brady (9 April 2025). "coreutils-9.7 released [stable]". Retrieved 9 April 2025.

[2] "The GNU Core Utilities Open Source Project on Open Hub: Languages Page". Archived from the original on 2019-03-28. Retrieved 2019-03-28.

[5] "GNU file utilities release 1.0". groups.google.com.

[6] "GNU shell programming utilities released". groups.google.com.

[7] "new GNU file and text utilities released". groups.google.com.

[8] "GNU's Who".

[merge-9] Meyering, Jim (2003-01-13). "README-package-renamed-to-coreutils". Archived from the original on 2019-12-25. Retrieved 2018-08-15.

[10] Meyering, Jim (2007-07-23). "COPYING: Update to Version 3". Archived from the original on 2019-12-25. Retrieved 2018-08-15.

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v t e GNU Project
History	GNU Manifesto Free Software Foundation Europe India Latin America History of free software
Licenses	GNU General Public License linking exception font exception GNU Lesser General Public License GNU Affero General Public License GNU Free Documentation License GNAT Modified General Public License
Software	GNU (variants) Hurd Linux-libre glibc Bash coreutils findutils Build system GCC binutils GDB GRUB GNUstep GIMP Jami GNU Emacs GNU TeXmacs GNU Octave GNU Taler GNU R GSL GMP GNU Electric GNU Archimedes GNUnet GNU Privacy Guard Gnuzilla (IceCat) GNU Health GNUmed GNU LilyPond GNU Go GNU Chess Gnash Guix more...
Contributors	Benjamin Mako Hill Bradley M. Kuhn Brian Fox Federico Heinz John Sullivan Nagarjuna G. Richard M. Stallman
Other topics	GNU/Linux naming controversy Revolution OS Free Software Foundation anti-Windows campaigns Defective by Design

v t e GNU Core Utilities command-line interface programs
File system	chcon chmod chown chgrp cksum cp dd df dir dircolors install ln ls mkdir mkfifo mknod mktemp mv realpath rm rmdir shred sync touch truncate vdir
Text utilities	b2sum base32 base64 cat cksum comm csplit cut expand fmt fold head join md5sum nl numfmt od paste ptx pr sha1sum shuf sort split sum tac tail tr tsort unexpand uniq wc
Shell utilities	arch basename chroot date dirname du echo env expr factor false groups hostid id link logname nice nohup nproc pathchk pinky printenv printf pwd readlink runcon seq sleep stat stdbuf stty tee test timeout true tty uname unlink uptime users who whoami yes

v t e Unix command-line interface programs and shell builtins
File system	cat chattr chmod chown chgrp cksum cmp cp dd du df file fuser ln ls mkdir mv pax pwd rm rmdir split tee touch type umask
Processes	at bg crontab fg kill nice ps time
User environment	env exit logname mesg talk tput uname who write
Text processing	awk basename comm csplit cut diff dirname ed ex fold head iconv join m4 more nl paste patch printf read sed sort strings tail tr troff uniq vi wc xargs
Shell builtins	alias cd echo test unset wait
Searching	find grep
Documentation	man
Software development	ar ctags lex make nm strip yacc
Miscellaneous	bc cal expr lp od sleep true and false
Categories Standard Unix programs Unix SUS2008 utilities List

History

See also

Notes

References

External links