I have a small piece of code that I need to iterate 24 times (for each hour of a day).... here's what it looks like now...

while read hour file; do
       
    if [ $hour -eq 00 ]; then
        count=`awk -F, 'BEGIN { count=0 } ............. { count++ } END { print count }' $file`
        hourly01=`expr $hourly1 + $trade_count`
    elif [ $hour -eq 01 ]; then
        count=`awk -F, 'BEGIN { count=0 } ............. { count++ } END { print count }' $file`
        hourly02=`expr $hourly2 + $trade_count`
    ..................
    fi

done < ls.txt

for (x=00; x<=23; x++) {
    if [ $hour -eq $x ]; then
        count=`awk -F, 'BEGIN { count=0 } ............. { count++ } END { print count }' $file`
        hourly$x=`expr ${hourly}$x + $trade_count`
    fi
}

awk supports arrays.

The

'{ count=0 } ............. { count++ } END { print count }'

I'm now considering doing it in the way you suggested, but I have another question about your suggested method.

My problem: Originally I ran something like ls -al | grep Jun 22 | cut -c49-100 >> myLs.txt to give me just the time and filename of all files for June 22nd in a text file.

With that text file I began awking.

You're suggesting that instead of using while read hour file that I begin the awk right away, to avoid repeating all that code that I did.

Since the text file with the LS holds the filenames of CSV files, I need to be able to, at some point, awk those files to perform some count calculations. I don't think I could use a nested awk.. awk within an awk to open those files found in the first awk. (or could I?).

I'll pick up the book over the weekend, thanks.

awk supports the system() function just like in C and php.

You can create a dynamic string, then pass it to system to create output.

It's not that awk is better than script or vice-versa - it's just bad to keep using several different tools and bouncing back and forth among them. IMO.

you typen in sudo a the biginng of the program coman to override the scynan cheak.