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Cut, Awk Commands

The cut command in Linux is used to extract sections from each line of files based on byte position, character, or field, with various options for customization. The awk command is a powerful scripting language for data manipulation and report generation, allowing users to define patterns and actions for processing text. Both commands have specific syntax and built-in variables that enhance their functionality in handling text data.

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10 views2 pages

Cut, Awk Commands

The cut command in Linux is used to extract sections from each line of files based on byte position, character, or field, with various options for customization. The awk command is a powerful scripting language for data manipulation and report generation, allowing users to define patterns and actions for processing text. Both commands have specific syntax and built-in variables that enhance their functionality in handling text data.

Uploaded by

LE 406 uday
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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cut command

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The cut command in linux is a command for cutting out the sections from each line
of files and writing the result to standard output. It can be used to cut parts of
a line by byte position, character, and field.

The basic syntax of the cut command is:


cut OPTION... [FILE]...

Here is a list of the most commonly used options with the `cut` command:

-b, –bytes=LIST

Selects only the bytes specified in LIST (e.g., -b 1-3,7).

-c, –characters=LIST

Selects only the characters specified in LIST (e.g., -c 1-3,7).

-d, –delimiter=DELIM

Uses DELIM as the field delimiter character instead of the tab character.

-f, –fields=LIS

Selects only the fields specified in LIST, separated by the delimiter character
(default is tab).

-n

Do not split multi-byte characters (no effect unless -b or -c is specified).

–complement

Invert the selection of fields/characters. Print the fields/characters not


selected.

Awk command
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Awk is a scripting language used for manipulating data and generating reports. The
awk command programming language requires no compiling and allows the user to use
variables, numeric functions, string functions, and logical operators.

Awk is a utility that enables a programmer to write tiny but effective programs in
the form of statements that define text patterns that are to be searched for in
each line of a document and the action that is to be taken when a match is found
within a line. Awk is mostly used for pattern scanning and processing. It searches
one or more files to see if they contain lines that matches with the specified
patterns and then perform the associated actions.

Awk is abbreviated from the names of the developers – Aho, Weinberger, and
Kernighan.

1. AWK Operations:
(a) Scans a file line by line
(b) Splits each input line into fields
(c) Compares input line/fields to pattern
(d) Performs action(s) on matched lines
2. Useful For:
(a) Transform data files
(b) Produce formatted reports

3. Programming Constructs:
(a) Format output lines
(b) Arithmetic and string operations
(c) Conditionals and loops

Syntax:

awk options 'selection _criteria {action }' input-file > output-file

Built-In Variables In Awk


--------------------------

Awk’s built-in variables include the field variables—$1, $2, $3, and so on ($0 is
the entire line) — that break a line of text into individual words or pieces called
fields.

NR: NR command keeps a current count of the number of input records. Remember that
records are usually lines. Awk command performs the pattern/action statements once
for each record in a file.
NF: NF command keeps a count of the number of fields within the current input
record.
FS: FS command contains the field separator character which is used to divide
fields on the input line. The default is “white space”, meaning space and tab
characters. FS can be reassigned to another character (typically in BEGIN) to
change the field separator.
RS: RS command stores the current record separator character. Since, by default, an
input line is the input record, the default record separator character is a
newline.
OFS: OFS command stores the output field separator, which separates the fields when
Awk prints them. The default is a blank space. Whenever print has several
parameters separated with commas, it will print the value of OFS in between each
parameter.
ORS: ORS command stores the output record separator, which separates the output
lines when Awk prints them. The default is a newline character. print automatically
outputs the contents of ORS at the end of whatever it is given to print.

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