On Thu, 23 May 2019 13:45:02 -0400, Jude DaShiell said: > echo "first available message:" > scan -width 6|head -1
scan -width 6 first will be much faster. > echo "last available message:" > scan -width 6|tail -1 scan -width 6 last will be much faster. If you have 10,000 entries in a folder, scan first/last still has to read and sort the directory, but it can find first and last without opening a file. A quick test: [~] strace -f scan -width 6 +inbox 2>| /tmp/inbox | head -1 1 [~] grep open /tmp/inbox | tail -1 openat(AT_FDCWD, "1171", O_RDONLY) = 3 Yes, it reads that many files before the back-pressure SIGPIPE from 'head -1' exiting catches up with it. scan | tail will have to open and read all 10,000 files.....
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