this post was submitted on 03 Aug 2026
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Reverse chronological order, mostly
tac log.txt |head # would give you newest first
no good for sort because sort already supports -r
no need it for tail on large files because tail already skips to the end.
I do a lot of impromptu bash to sus crap out of logs.
when you're balls deep in
cat log|grep -v foo| rev|cut -f 1-3 -d \ | |rev
Sometimes tac comes in clutch.
That's fair. I'd usually just use less and drop to the end. My use cases would always need the older log before a newer log though because that's the start of the problem. At least that's how I operate.