Gnuplot: Shortest way to ignore first line in datafile
<p>I have a .csv datafile created by another 3rd party application that should be plotted using <code>gnuplot</code>.
Let's assume the file has the following format:</p>

<pre><code>1;2;3;4;5;6 &lt;-- This is the header line that should be ignored (with values 1;2;...;N)
1;1;2;1;1;1
2;3;3;3;5;6
3;4;1;1;1;4
</code></pre>

<p>The first column is the x-axis, the following columns should each be plotted as own lineplot (yes, I know, too many line plots within one plot may look bad, but just to get an idea). Here a MCVE:</p>

<pre><code>set terminal png size 1000,500    
set datafile separator ";" # CSV file is seperated with ;
plot \
  'C://tmp/test.csv' using 1:2 with lines title "A",\
  'C://tmp/test.csv' using 1:3 with lines title "B",\
  'C://tmp/test.csv' using 1:4 with lines title "C",\
  'C://tmp/test.csv' using 1:5 with lines title "D",\
  'C://tmp/test.csv' using 1:6 with lines title "E"
</code></pre>

<p>The problem is, that this also plots the first line as it would be data.</p>

<p>I know that to can ignore any line in the datafile by starting it with <code>#</code>, like <code>#1;2;3;4;5;6</code>, yet I do not want to edit the file, because it is also used by other tools.</p>

<p>Another way is to use <code>plot &lt;filename&gt; every ::1</code> to ignore the first line, which would mean that I would have to include <code>every ::1</code> 5 times in the above script, as explained <a href="http://jchain.github.io/blog/2011/11/08/gnuplot-how-to-skip-the-first-line-in-the-data-file/">in this link</a>. This would look like the following:</p>

<pre><code>set terminal png size 1000,500    
set datafile separator ";" # CSV file is seperated with ;
plot \
  'C://tmp/test.csv' every ::1 using 1:2 with lines title "A",\
  'C://tmp/test.csv' every ::1 using 1:3 with lines title "B",\
  'C://tmp/test.csv' every ::1 using 1:4 with lines title "C",\
  'C://tmp/test.csv' every ::1 using 1:5 with lines title "D",\
  'C://tmp/test.csv' every ::1 using 1:6 with lines title "E"
</code></pre>

<p>Is defining <code>every ::1</code> for every plot really the only way? Is there some shorter - preferable one-liner - way to ignore the first (n) line(s); some way to define the <code>every ::1</code> "globally" or something like (pseudocode) <code>set datafile ignorefirstnlines 1</code>?</p>