Efficiently extract multiple columns into variables - shell

This seems like it should be simple, but has been driving me nuts trying to find a way to phrase a search to answer it.
Quite simply I have a file structured as three columns consisting of a name, a path, and a pattern. While looping through the lines I would like to extract each of these into its own variable for use.
The solution I have currently is (forgive typos):
while read line
do
name=$(echo "$line" | awk '{print $1}')
path=$(echo "$line" | awk '{print $2}')
pattern=$(echo "$line" | awk '{print $3}')
done < "myFile.txt"
However this seems a really inefficient way to do it as it means invoking awk once for each variable. So, is there a better way to do this? The delimiter is just a tab at the moment, but I can change it to anything that's easier to work with.

while read name path pattern
do
# Do something
done < myFile.txt
And if you want to change your delimiter to something else, like a ,:
while IFS=, read name path pattern
do
# Do something
done < myFile.txt

Related

Why does the while loop in that bash script stop after the first line

I was stepping through a list of files with a bash script.
But: it always stopped after the first loop although the list in "$tempdat" was 10 lines long.
while IFS= read -r zeile; do
# Zielsteuerung
quelle=$(awk -F\/ '{print $2}')
if [[ "$quelle" == "foo" ]]; then
do that
else
do s.th. else
fi
rsync somefiles
done < "$tempdat"
After some searching I found the error, the awk was not correct
quelle=$(echo "$zeile"|awk -F\/ '{print $2}')
But: why did that mistake prevent the loop from finishing? Maybe someone with more bash insight could be so nice to enlighten me. :-)
The awk is consuming all of the data intended for the read in the condition of the loop. Instead of using awk to try to parse the line, it seems like you intend to do:
while IFS=/ read -r a quelle b; do
and read the second column of the file into the variable quelle.
You can also write:
quelle=$(echo "$zeile" | awk -F\/ '{print $2}')
but it is generally best practice to let read split the fields for you.

Swap in shell from file

Through cut -d":" -f1,3 I made a new file which looks like this:
username1:number1
username2:number2
username3:number3
But my point is, I want to my file to looks like this:
number1:username1
number2:username2
number3:username3
I tried that cut -d":" -f3,1 but it still gets me username1:number1 even when I want to be that 3rd column be the 1st and the 1st column to print it like a last one ... Any help with that ?
cut -f3,1 will print the same as cut -f1,3. Use awk:
awk -F: '{print $3 FS $1}' file
I like awk for this sort of thing. You've already got an awk answer though.
To do this in pure bash, you'd do the following:
while IFS=: read -r one two; do printf '%s:%s\n' "$two" "$one"; done < input.txt
The IFS variable is the field separator used to slice up the input into separate variables for read, and I'm using printf to gives us predictably formatted output.

Shell cut delimiter before last

I`m trying to cut a string (Name of a file) where I have to get a variable in the name.
But the problem is, I have to put it in a shell variable, until now it is ok.
Here is the example of what i have to do.
NAME_OF_THE_FILE_VARIABLEiWANTtoGET_DATE
NAMEfile_VARIABLEiWANT_DATE
NAME_FILE_VARIABLEiWANT_DATE
The position of the variable I want always can change, but it will be always 1 before last. The delimiter is the "_".
Is there a way to count the size of the array to get size-1 or something like that?
OBS: when i cut strings I always use things like that:
VARIABLEiWANT=`echo "$FILENAME" | cut 1 -d "_"`
awk -F'_' '{print $(NF-1)}' file
or you have a string
awk -F'_' '{print $(NF-1)}' <<< "$FILENAME"
save the output of above oneliner into your variable.
IFS=_ read -a array <<< "$FILENAME"
variable_i_want=${array[${#array[#]}-2]}
It's a bit of a mess visually, but it's more efficient than starting a new process. ${#array[#]} is the number of elements read from FILENAME, so the indices for the array range from 0 to ${#array[#]}-1.
As of bash 4.3, though, you can use a negative index instead of computing it.
variable_i_want=${array[-2]}
If you need POSIX compatibility (no arrays), then
tmp=${FILENAME%_${FILENAME##*_}} # FILENAME with last field removed
variable_i_want=${tmp##*_} # last field of tmp
Just got it... I find someone using a cat function... I got to use it with the echo... and rev. didn't understand the rev thing, but I think it revert the order of the delimiter.
CODIGO=`echo "$ARQ_NAME" | rev | cut -d "_" -f 2 | rev `

CSV Two Column List With Spaces. Need everything before or everything after in two separate variables

I have a CSV list that is two columns (col1 is Share Name, col2 is file system path). I need two variables for either everything BEFORE the comma, or everything AFTER the column. My issue is that either column potentially has spaces, and even though these are quoted in the output, my script isn't handling them properly.
CSV:
ShareName,/path/to/sharename
"Share with spaces",/path/to/sharewithspaces
ShareWithSpace,"/path/to/share with spaces"
I was using this awk statement to get either field 1 or field 2:
echo $line | awk -F "\"*,\"*" '{print $2}'
BUT, I soon realized that it wasn't handling the spaces properly, even when passing that command to a variable and quoting the variable.
So, then after googling my brain out, I was trying this:
echo $line | cut -d, -f2
Which works, EXCEPT when echoing the variable $line. If I echo the string, it works perfectly, but unfortunately I'm using this in a while/read/do.
I am fairly certain my issue is having to define fields and having whitespace, but I really only need before or after a comma.
Here's the stripped down version so there's no sensitive data.
#!/usr/bin/bash
ssh <ip> <command> > "2_shares.txt"
<command> > "1_shares.txt"
file1="1_shares.txt"
file2="2_shares.txt"
while read -r line
do
share=`echo "$line" | awk -F "\"*,\"*" '{print $1}'`
path=`echo "$line" | awk -F "\"*,\"*" '{print $2}'`
if grep "$path" $file2 > /dev/null;
then
:
else
echo "SHARE NEEDS CREATED FOR $line"
case $path in
*)
blah blah blah
;;
esac
fi
done < "$file1"
You could simply do like this,
awk -F',' '{print $2}' file
To skip the first line.
awk -F',' 'NR>1{print $2}' file
Your issue is simply that you aren't quoting your shell variables. ALWAYS quote shell variables unless you have a very specific reason not to and are fully aware of all of the consequences.
I strongly suspect the rest of your script is completely wrong in it's approach since you apparently didn't know to quote variables and are talking about shell loops and echoing one line at time to awk so please do post a followup question if you'd like help.

String Manipulation in Bash

I am a newbie in Bash and I am doing some string manipulation.
I have the following file among other files in my directory:
jdk-6u20-solaris-i586.sh
I am doing the following to get jdk-6u20 in my script:
myvar=`ls -la | awk '{print $9}' | egrep "i586" | cut -c1-8`
echo $myvar
but now I want to convert jdk-6u20 to jdk1.6.0_20. I can't seem to figure out how to do it.
It must be as generic as possible. For example if I had jdk-6u25, I should be able to convert it at the same way to jdk1.6.0_25 so on and so forth
Any suggestions?
Depending on exactly how generic you want it, and how standard your inputs will be, you can probably use AWK to do everything. By using FS="regexp" to specify field separators, you can break down the original string by whatever tokens make the most sense, and put them back together in whatever order using printf.
For example, assuming both dashes and the letter 'u' are only used to separate fields:
myvar="jdk-6u20-solaris-i586.sh"
echo $myvar | awk 'BEGIN {FS="[-u]"}; {printf "%s1.%s.0_%s",$1,$2,$3}'
Flavour according to taste.
Using only Bash:
for file in jdk*i586*
do
file="${file%*-solaris*}"
file="${file/-/1.}"
file="${file/u/.0_}"
do_something_with "$file"
done
i think that sed is the command for you
You can try this snippet:
for fname in *; do
newname=`echo "$fname" | sed 's,^jdk-\([0-9]\)u\([0-9][0-9]*\)-.*$,jdk1.\1.0_\2,'`
if [ "$fname" != "$newname" ]; then
echo "old $fname, new $newname"
fi
done
awk 'if(match($9,"i586")){gsub("jdk-6u20","jdk1.6.0_20");print $9;}'
The if(match()) supersedes the egrep bit if you want to use it. You could use substr($9,1,8) instead of cut as well.
garph0 has a good idea with sed; you could do
myvar=`ls jdk*i586.sh | sed 's/jdk-\([0-9]\)u\([0-9]\+\).\+$/jdk1.\1.0_\2/'`
You're needing the awk in there is an artifact of the -l switch on ls. For pattern substitution on lines of text, sed is the long-time champion:
ls | sed -n '/^jdk/s/jdk-\([0-9][0-9]*\)u\([0-9][0-9]*\)$/jdk1.\1.0_\2/p'
This was written in "old-school" sed which should have greater portability across platforms. The expression says:
don't print lines unless they match -n
on lines beginning with 'jdk' do:
on a line that contains only "jdk-IntegerAuIntegerB"
change it to "jdk.1.IntegerA.0_IntegerB"
and print it
Your sample becomes even simpler as:
myvar=`echo *solaris-i586.sh | sed 's/-solaris-i586\.sh//'`

Resources