Can I redirect from multiple files?

Yes, you can redirect input from multiple files in command-line interfaces, but the method depends on the command you are using. Here are a few ways to do it:

1. Using cat to Combine Files

You can use the cat command to concatenate multiple files and then redirect the output to another file.

Example:

cat file1.txt file2.txt > combined.txt

This command combines the contents of file1.txt and file2.txt and writes the result to combined.txt.

2. Using Input Redirection with Commands

Some commands can accept multiple files as arguments directly, so you don't need to use < for each file. For example, many commands like sort, grep, or wc can take multiple files as input.

Example:

sort file1.txt file2.txt > sorted_output.txt

This command sorts the contents of both file1.txt and file2.txt and writes the sorted output to sorted_output.txt.

3. Using find with xargs

If you want to process multiple files found by a command, you can use find in combination with xargs.

Example:

find . -name "*.txt" | xargs cat > combined.txt

This command finds all .txt files in the current directory and combines them into combined.txt.

Summary

While you can't use < to redirect from multiple files directly, you can achieve similar results by using commands that accept multiple file arguments or by combining files with cat. If you have a specific use case in mind, feel free to share for more tailored advice!