I have 2 lines of data:

1. AAAAA 12345 55555
2. BBBBB 33333 88888

I want to be able to grep a position in line 1.
For example, lets say the 12345 in line 1 are in positions 7-11.
Can I grep positions 7-11 of line 1? If so, how do I do this? These will change every day so I need to grep a position and not a specific range of numbers.

There are many ways that this can be done; here's one using awk.

change $2 to whatever field you need.

I don't have a pattern. I am trying to list out a specific position.

Homework perhaps?

awk '{print $2}' your data

That worked. Thanks for your help.

Hey,

I really want to grep some specific positions in a line of letters. E.g. I need to know what's on position 10, 26 and 78.

I've tried some of the hints posted but nothing seem to work and my brain is fried..
Anyone with an easy way of solving this?
Thanks A LOT!

format of text:
>1A6A.B
PRFLEYSTSECHFFNGTERVRYLDRYFHNQEENVRFDSDVGEFRAVTELGRPDAEYWNSQKDLLEQKRGRVDNYCRHNYG
VVESFTVQRRVHPKVTVYPSKTQPLQHHNLLVCSVSGFYPGSIEVRWFRNGQEEKTGVVSTGLIHNGDWTFQTLVMLETV
PRSGEVYTCQVEHPSVTSPLTVEWRAR


Though I can cut out the lines with the idenfication '>1A6A.b' if it simplifies things.

if you just wanna know whats at position 10,26 and so on.. you can go for awk and use go through the man page of awk...