Script to find the number of tab delimiters in a line

poornimajayan · #1 (**permalink**) 09-27-2008

Hi,
I need to find the number of tab delimiters in the first line of a file.So using
word=`head -1 files.txt`
I have extracted the first line of file into a variable word.It has 20 tab delimted columns.So can anyone help me in finding the number of delimiters?
I am using csh and I am a beginner.I feel like printf and awk are not working. Not sure
Also I would like to know how can I call this shell using Autosys Jobs by giving the file name as a parameter.Do I need to write the script something like a function?
As of now I am reading from the user as echoing and reading the filename.But how I will implement in Autosys?
Please help.
Thanks,
Poornima

jim mcnamara · #2 (**permalink**) 09-29-2008

Few people here are good with csh, me included. There are good reasons to avoid it.
However, you can get the answer with awk. Try gawk or nawk if you have them.

Code:

head -1 file | awk -F'*' '{print $NF -1 }'

* where * -- the tab key

rajendra44 · #3 (**permalink**) 09-29-2008

Hi u can try this

This will give the count of Tab or delimeter
1. head -1 file | awk -F'<delimiter>' '{print NF -1}'

2. head -1 file | awk '{print NF -1}' as defult it takes space and tabs as delimeter

Thanks

joeyg · #4 (**permalink**) 09-29-2008

Code:

> cat infile2
joe     blue    1       15      99
harry   orange  5       13      2
steve   red     57      99      98
> head -1 infile2 | tr -d "\n" | tr "\t" "\n" | wc -l
4

Explained:
head -1 takes the top line
tr -d "\n" gets rid of extra line feeds
tr "\t" "n" converts tabs to line feeds
wc -l counts the number of lines (that line feeds caused)

poornimajayan · #5 (**permalink**) 09-29-2008

Thanks a lot gurus.
I used Joeyg's approach and it worked.
When I tried Jim's solution head -1 file | awk -F'|' '{print $NF -1 }', it is giving me -1.Just of curiosity..What does that mean?
Anyway thanks.It helped me..

jim mcnamara · #6 (**permalink**) 09-29-2008

my bad: wrong field separator - I edited the post.

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