Columns - the end (so you thought) :)

[MYERS]

} Thanks to all who answered. It is interesting to me how often strings
} and string manipulation are the subject of problems and questions in
} the C-Unix environment. 
} 
} To summarize:
} 
} Problem: convert "every | good | boy | does | fine" to
} 
} every
} good
} boy
} does
} fine
} 
} Answers: Consensus seemed to be to use sed to strip whitespace.
} Then to add newlines:
} 
} 1 ) gawk
} 
} awk -F\| '{for (i=0;i<=NF;i++) {printf "%s\n,$i}}'
} 
} 2) tr
} 
} tr '|' '\012'
} 
} 3) fmt
} 
} sed 's/|//g' | fmt -1
} 
} I guess I liked #2 myself. #1 seemed a little obtuse. #3 might cause
} problems with fields that contained whitespace in their midst.
} Thanks again!
} 
} Regards - Jim
} -- 
} James N. McClatchey P.E. (Southern Aluminum Finishing Co, Atlanta, GA, USA)
} Architectural Aluminum. Custom Fabrication. Paint, Powder Coating, Anodizing
} mailto:jnm at saf.com Voice: 404-355-1560 Fax: 404-350-0581
} http://www.saf.com   SAF Home Page

Just like a programmer, I can't let this one go.  I didn't consider
fields with imbedded white space in the original solution because the
specs didn't specify as such. :)  Anyway, I propose yet another (g)awk
solution that will address this concern:

nawk -F'|' '{for (i=0;i<=NF;i++) {
	gsub("^[ \t]", "", $i)
	gsub("[ \t]$", "", $i)
	printf "%s\n",$i}
}' foo

$ cat foo

this | is | a true | statement

Now this is using nawk on SunOS, but I'd be willing to bet a good beer that
this will work under LINUX.  Just had to get my last test in. :)


       Until later,       attmail!gamyers      ph  404.810.3250
       Geoffrey Myers                          fax 404.810.2487

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      gamyers at attmail.com   geof at denali.is.net   eiger at ichange.com