awk on a string

melanie_pfefer · #1 (**permalink**) 07-24-2008

Hi

I am trying to do

Code:

awk -F: '{print $3}' a:b:c

to get c.

awk however expects a file:

Code:

awk: can't open a:b:c

any idea?

Franklin52 · #2 (**permalink**) 07-24-2008

Please place your code between code tags.
You can select your code and click on the # symbol above the edit window or place your code between code brackets as follow:

HTML Code:

[code]
awk -F: '{print $3}' file
[/code]

radoulov · #3 (**permalink**) 07-24-2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by melanie_pfefer

[...]awk however expects a file:

It's the expected behavior. If you really need to do something like this with AWK, you should write something like this:

Code:

awk 'BEGIN { 
  split(ARGV[1], t, ":")
  print t[3]
  }' a:b:c

mph · #4 (**permalink**) 07-24-2008

For a string try this:

Code:

assuming: var="a:b:c"
echo "$var" | awk -F: '{print $3}'

Franklin52 · #5 (**permalink**) 07-24-2008

More possibilities:

Code:

echo 'a:b:c' | sed 's/.*://'

Or:

Code:

echo 'a:b:c' | awk -F: '$0=$3'

radoulov · #6 (**permalink**) 07-24-2008

Actually,
it could be easily done in shell without any external command
(unless, as already stated, there is another reason to use AWK in this particular case):

Code:

% s=a:b:c
% (IFS=:;set -- $s;printf "$3\n")
c

With Z-Shell:

Code:

zsh-4.3.4% print ${${(s.:.)s}[3]}
c

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