tailf

Additional Notes

tailf displays the last 10 lines of a file and then waits for new content to be appended, displaying it as it is written. It is a simpler version of tail -f that uses inotify (or similar file monitoring) to detect changes rather than polling, making it more efficient.

tailf is designed for monitoring log files. It does not support options for different starting line counts or other tail features. It has been deprecated in favor of tail -f or tail --follow=name on most modern systems.

Syntax

tailf file

Parameters

• file: The file to monitor for new content.

Examples

tailf /var/log/syslog

Display the last 10 lines of /var/log/syslog and follow new content.

tailf /var/log/apache2/access.log

Monitor Apache access logs in real time.

Practical Notes

• tailf is deprecated. Use tail -f or tail --follow=name instead.
• tail -f polls the file every second; tailf uses filesystem monitoring for efficiency.
• tail -F (follow with retry) handles log rotation better than tailf.
• The less command with +F also provides follow-mode (shift+F while in less).
• On modern systems, journalctl -f provides real-time journal log following.