The default fills columns vertically and separates them with TABs.-c/--output-width selects a width; the default is positive COLUMNSor 80. A width of 0 or unlimited prints one input record per line.-x/--fillrows fills rows first.
-t/--table aligns fields from all input files in one table.-s/--separator supplies a set of delimiter bytes and preserves emptyfields; the default splits runs of space and TAB. -o/--output-separatorreplaces the default two spaces between table columns. Table alignment excludescomplete ANSI color sequences from the display width while preserving their bytes.Empty input lines are skipped and every output record ends with a newline. Omit fileoperands for stdin; a literal - is a filename, as in util-linux 2.40.
Layout follows the GNU/Linux C locale: non-ASCII bytes are escaped as\xHH. Non-ASCII input delimiters are rejected. Automatic terminal width,locale display widths, tree/JSON output and the full util-linux tablegrammar are not implemented. --help and --version are available.
Standalone --version prints exactly column 0.1.2 followed by onenewline. Standalone --help starts with Usage: column, lists bothmetadata options, and ends with a newline. Both write to stdout, leave stdinunread, and exit with status 0. Exact-version publication and verificationremain recorded separately in the support record.