change field separator only from nth field until NF


 
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# 1  
Old 08-17-2012
change field separator only from nth field until NF

Hi !

input:
Code:
111|222|333|aaa|bbb|ccc
999|888|777|nnn|kkk
444|666|555|eee|ttt|ooo|ppp

With awk, I am trying to change the FS "|" to "; " only from the 4th field until the end (the number of fields vary between records).

In order to get:
Code:
111|222|333|aaa; bbb; ccc
999|888|777|nnn; kkk
444|666|555|eee; ttt; ooo; ppp

I tried something like:
Code:
gawk 'BEGIN{FS=OFS="|"}{for(i=5; i<=NF; i++) $4 = $4 ($4?"; ":"")$i}1' input

It works for the 4th field, but it also prints the original fields from $5 to $NF after:
Code:
111|222|333|aaa; bbb; ccc|bbb|ccc
999|888|777|nnn; kkk|kkk
444|666|555|eee; ttt; ooo; ppp|ttt|ooo|ppp

Is there any way to to create an array from $4 until $NF without knowing the number of fields (a[$4...$NF])???

Thanks for your help !
# 2  
Old 08-17-2012
I think this is what you are looking for:

Code:
awk -F '|' '
    {
        for( i = 1; i < NF; i++ )
            printf( "%s%s", $(i), i > 3 ? ";" : "|" );
        printf( "%s\n", $(i) );
    }
' input-file >output-file

This User Gave Thanks to agama For This Post:
 
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