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Full Discussion: splitting a large text file into paragraphs
Top Forums Shell Programming and Scripting splitting a large text file into paragraphs Post 302536000 by lupin..the..3rd on Sunday 3rd of July 2011 07:55:46 PM
Old 07-03-2011
splitting a large text file into paragraphs
Hello all, newbie here. I've searched the forum and found many "how to split a text file" topics but none that are what I'm looking for.

I have a large text file (~15 MB) in size. It contains a variable number of "paragraphs" (for lack of a better word) that are each of variable length. A paragraph might be 2 lines long, or it might be 2000 lines long, or anything in between. Each paragraph begins with the same string of text in its first line, and is preceded by a blank line. There could be random blank lines throughout each paragraph. The "paragraph start" string ONLY appears at the start of each paragraph and never anywhere else.

I need a script that will read this huge text file, and save each paragraph out as a separate text file with some kind of unique name.

For example, if our big file contains:

Code:
Paragraph start. sdfgsdfgsdfggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg
dddddddddddddfgsddddddddddddddddddddddddddd
gfdsssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss
33333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333

Paragraph start. gfdsdfgsdfgsdfgsdfdssssssssssssssssssssssssssssffffff
fgfdssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss
gfdsssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss
gfdsssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

gfdsdrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

gsssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss
kkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk
llllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll

Paragraph start. gfdsdfggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg
5555555555555555555555555555555555555555555555

I need it to read this big file, and produce the following separate text files:

Output file 1:
Code:
Paragraph start. sdfgsdfgsdfggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg
dddddddddddddfgsddddddddddddddddddddddddddd
gfdsssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss
33333333333333333333333333333333333333333333333

Output file 2:
Code:
Paragraph start. gfdsdfgsdfgsdfgsdfdssssssssssssssssssssssssssssffffff
fgfdssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss
gfdsssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss
gfdsssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss

gfdsdrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr

gsssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssssss
kkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk
llllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll

Output file 3:
Code:
Paragraph start. gfdsdfggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggggg
5555555555555555555555555555555555555555555555

It seems like a simple problem, but it is above the reach of my modest shell scripting skills.

Thanks in advance!
 

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LEARN ABOUT DEBIAN

gpdftext

GPDFTEXT(1)						      gpdftext User Commands						       GPDFTEXT(1)

NAME

       gpdftext - is a GTK+ text editor for ebook PDF files.

SYNOPSIS

       gpdftext

DESCRIPTION

       This manual page documents briefly the gpdftext package. For more information on gpdftext, see the gPDFText Manual:

	   $ yelp ghelp:gpdftext

       gpdftext is a GTK+ text editor for ebook PDF files.

       gpdftext loads the PDF, extracts the text, reformats the paragraphs into single long lines and then puts the text into a standard GTK+
       editor where you can make other adjustments.

       On the ebook reader, the plain text file then has no unwanted line breaks and can be zoomed to whatever text size you prefer.

OPTIONS

       There are no command-line options supported currently.

       PDF files passed on the command line will be opened by gpdftext.

BUGS

       Please use the Debian BTS or the upstream Trac tickets.

       Debian BTS[1] or SourceForge Trac tickets[2]. (Trac requires a SourceForge login to file new tickets.)

AUTHOR

       Neil Williams <codehelp@debian.org>
	   Wrote this manpage for the Debian system.

COPYRIGHT

       Copyright (C) 2009 Neil Williams

       This manual page was written for the Debian system (and may be used by others).

       Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU General Public License, Version 3 or (at
       your option) any later version published by the Free Software Foundation.

       On Debian systems, the complete text of the GNU General Public License can be found in /usr/share/common-licenses/GPL.

NOTES

	1. Debian BTS
	   http://bugs.debian.org/gpdftext

	2. SourceForge Trac tickets
	   http://sourceforge.net/apps/trac/gpdftext/newticket

gpdftext							    04/15/2011							       GPDFTEXT(1)
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