I'm new to shell scripting and I have a file with positional columns. The rows look like this:

222 3333 44444 55 55 55 55 5555 59999
222 3333 44444 55 55 55 55 5555 59999

Not every row has the same number of spaces between the seven columns. They can range anywhere from one space to seven, for instance. But ultimately, I want the file to be a clean .csv:

222,3333,44444,"55 55","55 55",5555,59999
222,3333,44444,"55 55","55 55",5555,59999

How might I accomplish this? Any help would be much appreciated.

using sed to do a search relpace...

# cat file | sed -e 's/ */,/g' > newfile

No need for the cat

sed -e 's/ */,/g' file > newfile

None of the solutions above don't give the desired output!

Try this, the awk command loops through the fields 4 until 7 and adds a double quote before the even fields and one after the odd fields:

 awk '{for(i=4;i<=7;i++){$i=i%2?$i"\"":"\""$i}}1' file

Franklin52, Why cant I keep it simple like this....

awk '{printf("%d,%d,%d,\"%d %d\",\"%d %d\",%d,%d\n",$1,$2,$3,$4,$5,$6,$7,$8,$9)}'

No problem with it, everyone has his own taste, I like it spicy an hot!

Cheers

because you might never know there will be more fields in the future. using the for loop is easier to modify next time.