What Is Ctrl M Character in Unix?
Contents

Ctrl M or ^M is the carriage return character. Those come in the file because of different line termination characters used by Unix and Windows/DOS operating systems. Unix uses only line feed (LF) while windows use both carriage return (CR) and line feed (LF) as termination characters.

What is control M character in Linux?

Viewing the certificate files in Linux shows ^M characters appended to every line. The file in question was created in Windows and then copied over to Linux. ^M is the keyboard equivalent to r or CTRL-v + CTRL-m in vim.

How do I delete M character?

Remove CTRL-M characters from a file in UNIX

  1. The easiest way is probably to use the stream editor sed to remove the ^M characters. Type this command: % sed -e “s/^M//” filename > newfilename. …
  2. You can also do it in vi: % vi filename. Inside vi [in ESC mode] type: :%s/^M//g. …
  3. You can also do it inside Emacs.
Robert Thorne

Robert Thorne

Automotive & Future Transportation Editor

Robert Thorne covers electric vehicle innovations, autonomous driving systems, global mobility trends, and automotive engineering developments.

Share this article
Twitter Facebook Pinterest