I agree, I use cat all the time, it is a normalization of access patterns. it lets you isolate the file input and output into it's own section of the pipeline.

I agree, I use cat all the time, it is a normalization of access patterns. it lets you isolate the file input and output into it's own section of the pipeline. There is nothing wrong with using the shell redirection operators but I like seeing the input and output in it's own explicit pipeline section. get file data and put it on the pipe: cat get pipe data and put it in a file: tee (with huge caveat you have to do something with stdout so you still need to mess around with the redirection operators. tee does not really gain you any normalization. Sigh. I would make a tee that is just "tee > /dev/null" but I am used to it at this point. Stockholm syndrome?)