Remove leading and trailing spaces from a file


 
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# 1  
Old 07-12-2017
Remove leading and trailing spaces from a file

Hi,

I am trying to remove leading and trailing spaces from a file using awk but somehow I have not been able to do it.

Here is the data that I want to trim.

Code:
07/12/2017 15:55:00               |entinfdev        |AD ping Time ms          |      .474|      1.41|      .581|green        |flat
07/12/2017 15:55:00              |entinfdev                         |CPU Busy%             |         1|         2|         1|green      |flat
07/12/2017 15:55:00        |entinfdev            |Collected at                |1499888700|1499889000|1499889300|grey        |flat
07/12/2017 15:55:00      |entinfdev     |FS /tmp Used%             |         1|         1|         1|green  |flat
07/12/2017 15:55:00 |entinfdev    |FS /var/tmp Used%            |        74|        74|        74|orange    |flat

And I want the data to be looked like this.

Code:
07/12/2017 15:55:00|entinfdev|AD ping Time ms|.474|1.41|.581|green|flat
07/12/2017 15:55:00|entinfdev|CPU Busy%|1|2|1|green|flat
07/12/2017 15:55:00|entinfdev|Collected at|1499888700|1499889000|1499889300|grey|flat
07/12/2017 15:55:00|entinfdev|FS /tmp Used%|1|1|1|green|flat
07/12/2017 15:55:00|entinfdev|FS /var/tmp Used%|74|74|74|orange|flat

Please let me know if there a better way to do it.

Thank you.

Last edited by svajhala; 07-12-2017 at 06:31 PM..
# 2  
Old 07-12-2017
Seems to be an easier job for sed than awk. Show us the awk you have, maybe we can work with that.
# 3  
Old 07-12-2017
Try using sed. First create a file like demo.sed containing
Code:
s/ *\| */|/g

and run it with
Code:
sed -f demo.sed myFileToConvert >convertedFile

Of course "demo" can be replaced with something meaningful in your shop.

What this does is delete any spaces on either side of the "|" character, as many times as needed for each line.

HTH
# 4  
Old 07-12-2017
I tried the following awk command.

Code:
awk 'BEGIN{FS=" * *"; OFS="|"} {$1=$1; print}' temp_dbinfo.7880

However its inserting 'pipes' where it is not required as shown below. Also in some places it is inserting double pipes instead of one.

Code:
07/12/2017|15:55:00||entinfdev||AD|ping|Time|ms|||.474||1.41||.581|green||flat
07/12/2017|15:55:00||entinfdev||CPU|Busy%|||1||2||1|green||flat
07/12/2017|15:55:00||entinfdev||Collected|at||1499888700|1499889000|1499889300|grey||flat
07/12/2017|15:55:00||entinfdev||FS|/tmp|Used%|||1||1||1|green||flat

I want the date column and few other columns to be printed without the '|' between the date and the time, Something like,

Code:
07/12/2017 15:55:00

Code:
AD ping Time ms


Last edited by svajhala; 07-12-2017 at 06:43 PM..
# 5  
Old 07-13-2017
Try:
Code:
awk '{for(i=1; i<=NF; i++) sub(/^[ \t]+|[ \t]+$/,x,$i)}1' FS=\| OFS=\|  file

This User Gave Thanks to Scrutinizer For This Post:
# 6  
Old 07-13-2017
How about
Code:
awk 'gsub(/ *\| */, "|")+1' file

# 7  
Old 07-13-2017
@RudiC: I'd say that would work if there are only spaces and no tabs and there is no leading space in the first field and no trailing space in the last field.
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