Sponsored Content
Top Forums UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers ^H characters appear when opening text file using vi - RHEL Post 302819029 by kraljic on Monday 10th of June 2013 06:19:30 AM
Old 06-10-2013
^H characters appear when opening text file using vi - RHEL

Version Info:

Code:
$ cat /etc/redhat-release
Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server release 5.8 (Tikanga)
$
$ uname -a
Linux stryker138 2.6.18-308.13.1.el5 #1 SMP Thu Jul 26 05:45:09 EDT 2012 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

I redirected manpage of ksh command's output to a text file as shown below
Code:
$ pwd
/home/oracle/purge/stage1
$ man ksh >kshManPage.txt
$
$ vi kshManPage.txt

When I try to open using vi, the file seems to filed with ^H. It looked like below

Code:
$ vi kshManPage.txt
KSH(1)                                                                  KSH(1)



N^HNA^HAM^HME^HE
       ksh,  rksh,  pfksh  - KornShell, a standard/restricted command and pro-
       gramming language

S^HSY^HYN^HNO^HOP^HPS^HSI^HIS^HS
       k^Hks^Hsh^Hh [ ±^H±a^Hab^Hbc^Hce^Hef^Hfh^Hhi^Hik^Hkn^Hno^Hop^Hpr^Hrs^Hst^Htu^Huv^Hvx^HxB^HBC^HCD^HDP^HP ] [ -^H-R^HR file ] [ ±^H±o^Ho option ] ... [  -^H-  ]  [   arg ... ]

D^HDE^HES^HSC^HCR^HRI^HIP^HPT^HTI^HIO^HON^HN
       _^HK_^Hs_^Hh  is  a command and programming language that executes commands read
       from a terminal or a file.  _^HR_^Hk_^Hs_^Hh is a restricted version of the command
       interpreter  _^Hk_^Hs_^Hh;  it is used to set up login names and execution envi-
       ronments whose capabilities are more controlled than those of the stan-
       dard  shell.   _^HR_^Hp_^Hf_^Hk_^Hs_^Hh  is a profile shell version of the command inter-
       preter _^Hk_^Hs_^Hh; it is used to to execute commands with the attributes spec-
       ified by the userâs profiles (see _^Hp_^Hf_^He_^Hx_^He_^Hc(1)).  See _^HI_^Hn_^Hv_^Ho_^Hc_^Ha_^Ht_^Hi_^Ho_^Hn below for

But ^H characters don't appear when I open the file using cat


Code:
$ cat kshManPage.txt
KSH(1)                                                                  KSH(1)



NAME
       ksh,  rksh,  pfksh  - KornShell, a standard/restricted command and pro-
       gramming language

SYNOPSIS
       ksh [ ±abcefhiknoprstuvxBCDP ] [ -R file ] [ ±o option ] ... [  -  ]  [
       arg ... ]

DESCRIPTION
       Ksh  is  a command and programming language that executes commands read
       from a terminal or a file.  Rksh is a restricted version of the command
       interpreter  ksh;  it is used to set up login names and execution envi-
       ronments whose capabilities are more controlled than those of the stan-
       dard  shell.   Rpfksh  is a profile shell version of the command inter-
       preter ksh; it is used to to execute commands with the attributes spec-
       ified by the userâs profiles (see pfexec(1)).  See Invocation below for
       the meaning of arguments to the shell.
.
.
.
<output snipped>

Related info:

Just discovered that the vi used in RHEL is actually VIM !

Code:
$ which vi
/bin/vi
$
$ man vi
VIM(1)                                                                  VIM(1)

NAME
       vim - Vi IMproved, a programmers text editor

SYNOPSIS
       vim [options] [file ..]
       vim [options] -
       vim [options] -t tag
       vim [options] -q [errorfile]
.
.
.
DESCRIPTION
       Vim  is  a  text  editor that is upwards compatible to Vi.  It can be used to edit all kinds of plain text.  It is especially useful for editing
       programs.
.
.

<output snipped>

Any idea why ^H characters are appearing with vi and is there any way to fix it?
 

10 More Discussions You Might Find Interesting

1. Shell Programming and Scripting

How to delete a particular text without opening the file.

Hi, Could someone tell me how to delete a particular text inside an existing file without opening the file? e.g. I have a text file called mytext.txt which contains three lines of text below and I want to delete “ ;” and delete the second line “b ;” including the carriage return. a ; b ; c ;... (12 Replies)
Discussion started by: stevefox
12 Replies

2. UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Urgent help needed to delete some text without opening the file in unix

Hi To delete some text in 2 files in line1 ( not complete line) in unix without opening the files. For example: source file is like this <?xml version="1.0"... (5 Replies)
Discussion started by: pyaranoid
5 Replies

3. Shell Programming and Scripting

Read text from a file between two characters..

I have a requirement where i have to read from a .sh file a text lying bet characters like 'SELECT' & ';'...Please help me out in this. I am new to shell scripting. (2 Replies)
Discussion started by: goutam_igate
2 Replies

4. UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Help with deleting characters from text file

I have a text file that looks like this: I want to delete the last character of first column in all rows so that my output looks like this: Thanks a lot! (1 Reply)
Discussion started by: evelibertine
1 Replies

5. UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

Any way to get rid of ^M characters in a text file using pr?

When I use vi to see what's in the file I get this: int add1(int x) {^M return x + 1;^M} ^Mint subtract1(int x) {^M return x - 1;^M} ^Mint double_it(int x) {^M return x * 2;^M} ^Mint halve_it(int x) {^Mreturn x / 2;^M} ^Mint main() {^M int myint;^M int result;^M ... (2 Replies)
Discussion started by: Nonito84
2 Replies

6. Red Hat

Does RHEL 5 provide a command to collect RHEL system log in single compress file?

Hi, I heard a command that can collect all RHEL 5 log in a single compress file before I forget. Does any body know...What the command is ? Thanks. (4 Replies)
Discussion started by: nnnnnnine
4 Replies

7. Shell Programming and Scripting

Counting 2 characters with into 2 categories from a text file

I have a tab delimited file of the following format 2 L a 2 G b 2 L c 2 G a 3 G a 3 G b 3 L c 4 L a 4 G a 4 G b 4 L c 4 G a .. ... I want to count the number of G's and L's with in the first column and the third column/categories such that I would get an output file: (6 Replies)
Discussion started by: Lucky Ali
6 Replies

8. Shell Programming and Scripting

Check if the text file has more than 2 characters

Guys, I know that the below command will cut the 13th field from test.txt file awk -F"|" '{print $13}' test.txt The answer would be, CA CN Ohio If we see the 3 rd one, it has more than 2 characters. So i wanted to check this in if condition and i want to get the output if the 13th... (4 Replies)
Discussion started by: AraR87
4 Replies

9. Red Hat

How to display Chinese and Japanese Characters on Rhel 6?

Hello, I'm trying to figure out how to display Chinese and Japanese Characters on my RHEL 6 Console. There is no more "bogl-bterm" for RHEL6, that is not supported anymore. Is there any way that I could display them? Thank you. (2 Replies)
Discussion started by: pjeedu2247
2 Replies

10. Shell Programming and Scripting

Remove all junk characters from a text file

I am using flatfile, in that flat file we are getting the junk chars 1)I21001f<82>^Me<85>!h49 Service Charge 2) I21001f‚ e...!h49 Service Charge please tell me how to remove all junk chars in unix scripts. (1 Reply)
Discussion started by: Talari
1 Replies
All times are GMT -4. The time now is 03:46 AM.
Unix & Linux Forums Content Copyright 1993-2022. All Rights Reserved.
Privacy Policy