Hello there,

I have large tab-delimitated lists (see input file) and I need to convert it into tab-delimitated tables (see output file). I would like to do it with an awk script. Any ideas?

Input file:
header1 <tab> a <tab> a <tab> a <tab> a . . .
header2 <tab> b <tab> b <tab> b <tab> b . . .
header3 <tab> c <tab> c <tab> c <tab> c . . .
header4 <tab> d <tab> d <tab> d <tab> d . . .
. . .

Output file:
header1 <tab> header2 <tab> header3 <tab> header4 . . .
a <tab> b <tab> c <tab> d . . .
a <tab> b <tab> c <tab> d . . .
a <tab> b <tab> c <tab> d . . .
a <tab> b <tab> c <tab> d . . .
. . .

Somebody posted a matrix transform a few weeks back, search for that term? Not sure if it would work here but worth a shot.

Dear shamrock,

Thanks for the help - I have problems to execute the script.
I'm not sure it the problem is the $1 at the end?


./r2c.sh file.input

###########################

#!/bin/bash

awk '
{
for(f=1; f<=NF; f++)
r2c[f","NR] = $f
} END {
for(f=1; f<=NF; f++) {
for(row=1; row<=NR; row++)
printf("%s\t", r2c[f","row])
print ""
}
}' $1

#########################

Yep, that's the problem, where you declare $1?

Show the error you are getting.

I tried your version of the script with the following ending:

...}' file

executing the script with: r2c.sh

---

and I tried the following ending:

...}' $1

executing the script with: r2c.sh file

But nothing happens.