1. > is output redirection symbol.
2. >> is append output redirection symbol.

Syntax to save the output of a command to a file

The syntax is:

command > filename

Example: Saving the date command output to a file called output.txt

In this example, save the output of date command to a file called output.txt:
$ date > output.txt

Example: Running Unix/Linux command and saving output to a file

Please note that file-lists.txt file is created if it doesn’t exist. And if file file-lists.txt file is overwritten if it exits.

Feel free to replace command with the command you want to run on Linux/Unix and filename with the file to which you want to save (direct) the output. For example, run ls command and store its output the file called “file-lists.txt”:

ls -l /bin > file-lists.txt

To see the contents of file-list.txt, use cat command as follows:

cat file-lists.txt

OR use NA command as follows for the same purpose:

more file-lists.txt

Sample outputs:

Example: grep text and save to a file

You can use grep command to scan log files and save to a file. In this example, I am going to search/scan a log file called /var/log/httpd/access_log for spammer IP address ‘1.2.3.4’ and save to a file called spam-log.txt:

 # command must be run as root #
grep '1.2.3.4' /var/log/httpd/access_log  > /root/spam-log.txt

If your log file is too large, run a job (grep command) in the background with an ampersand (&) as follows:

 # command must be run as root #
grep '1.2.3.4' /var/log/httpd/access_log  > /root/spam-log.txt &

Syntax to save and append the output of a command to a file

The > operator always overwrite existing output files. To append the output of a command to the same file use >> operator as follows:
command >> filename
In this example run two commands called date and who and save output to the same file called demo.txt:

echo "Test" > demo.txt
## Append to same file ##
echo "A log file by $USER on $HOSTNAME" >> demo.txt
who >> demo.txt
cat demo.txt

Sample outputs:

Syntax to redirection of both standard error and output to a file

The basic syntax is as follows for redirection of both standard error and output on bash/ksh or POSIX shell:

command-name &>filename
 
## POSIX syntax ##
command-name >cmd.log 2>&1