What Is a Named Pipe?
A named pipe, also called a FIFO, is a filesystem object that acts as a one-way channel between processes that need not be related. One process opens it for writing and another for reading, and the kernel buffers the bytes in order. Unlike an anonymous pipe, it has a path so any process with access can connect to it.
Why it matters
Named pipes let separate programs stream data to each other without temporary files or sockets. They are a simple building block for shell scripts that wire one tool into another.
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