-bash: cat: command not found (or grep)

You have corrupted your PATH environment variable which tells the bash where to look for commands.

Start looking in one of the following files, as that is most likely where you were messing with PATH

.bash_profile

.bash_login

.profile

.bashrc

Fix your PATH and then restart your Terminal session.

If necessary, use commands such as

/bin/ls -a

/bin/cat .filename

/usr/bin/nano .filename

Message was edited by: BobHarris

What are the results of the following commands?

echo $PATH

/bin/launchctl getenv PATH

/bin/cat /private/etc/paths

/bin/ls /private/etc/paths.d/

Having an incorrect PATH established is a very common problem, and is fodder for a number of threads here as folks lose access to the various tools.

In general, PATH is a colon-seperated list of directories where bash will look for commands.

When PATH is incorrect, the easiest approach is to remove or review the modifications; to start over.

Whenever PATH is corrupted, you'll have to specify the full file paths to the tools you need. Explicitly. Or you'll need to use another session under a different user, or you can use a GUI-based shell-compatible text editor such as MacVim or TextWrangler. (You cannot use a GUI-based editor that write files that use any character encodings or file formats that the shell can't read.)

Here is an example of specifying an explicit path for the tools, and also how to locate where the tools are located, and how to use the pico, err, nano text editor to edit your .bash_profile file:

$ /usr/bin/whereis grep

/usr/bin/grep

$ /usr/bin/nano ~/.bash_profile

Once you edit your .bash_profile and remove or # comment out the PATH changes, exit the terminal session and restart.

Here is a bash introduction and here is advanced bash scripting. (Those are the HTML versions, There are PDFs of those documents over there, too.) There is the Apple introduction to the command line (10.6) manual, and the 10.7 command line is little different from that of 10.6.

What happens when you issue the command

/usr/bin/which grep

/usr/bin/which cat

/bin/ls -aleO@ /usr/bin/grep

/bin/ls -aleO@ /bin/cat

/usr/bin/file /usr/bin/grep

/usr/bin/file /bin/cat

Your PATH looks OK, so if you cannot find grep and cat, then it would imply the commands have either been removed from your system, or are no longer executable images

'cat' is stored in /bin/cat, NOT /usr/bin/cat, which explains the file not found messages above.

HOWEVER, the information you have provided seems to imply you have the executables, and previous information provides says you have a valid PATH:

echo $PATH
/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbin:/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/X11/bin:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/sbi n:/sbin:/usr/local/bin:/usr/X11/bin

this creates a mystery as to why you are getting:

-bash:  cat: command not found
-bash:  grep: command not found

I have a couple of thoughts.

a) I'm wondering if you have any 'alias' statements in your .bash_profile (or .bash_login, or .profile, or .bashrc).

b) if you would get the same results should you rename your .bash_profile (and/or .bash_login, .profile, .bashrc) to something like saved.bash_profile, then restart your terminal session (basically eliminating any personalized shell customization).

c) what would happen if you created a new account (System Preferences -> Accounts) - basically a clean starting point.

d) are you executing these commands from the command prompt? Or from within a shell script?

d.1) if from within a shell script, is the script file the correct file format.

file name.shell.script

you want to check that the output from the 'file' command DOES NOT say "...with CRLF line terminators...", as that would imply the the file came from (or through) a Windows system.

There have been a few reported cases of commands not working if following a pipe character which appears to be your situation.

Have a look at bash: command not found after piping for one example. See if that helps. post back otherwise.

Your PATH variable is set, but is not being exported to subshells. What do you get from this:

export -p | /usr/bin/grep PATH

And this:

( echo $PATH )

You should NOT need to type slowly to enter commands on the command line.

As I recall the problem that Frank Caggiano is referencing was caused by a bad keyboard.

You could try the following experiment:

cat -vte
anything | something | even more | with fake options -a -b -c | and even | more | junk <RETURN>
do it | again | and some| more <RETURN>
each | time you | hit return | cat -vte | will display the line | with any <RETURN>
invisible or control | characters | displayed so | you can | see them <RETURN>
<Control-D> # terminates the cat command.

The cat -vte will display invisible and control characters that you might not normally see as you type. If you keyboard is injecting extra junk when you type something, it will be visible after you enter <RETURN> on each line.

If you have another keyboard, plug it is and give that a try.

Message was edited by: BobHarris

As Bob wrote that wasn;t meant to solve your problem just to help identify where the problem might be.

Besides trying a different keyboard (or trying that keyboard on a different system) what language are you using and how do you enter the pipe character?