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Full Discussion: Replacing string/special characters using a 'conversion' table
Top Forums UNIX for Beginners Questions & Answers Replacing string/special characters using a 'conversion' table Post 302977271 by bakunin on Friday 15th of July 2016 10:42:04 AM
Old 07-15-2016
Quote:
Originally Posted by newbie_01
For example, I want to replace CTRL-I with an underscore, tabs with 3 spaces, CTRL-M with UNIX's newline etc.
You can simply use sed to that that, eventually embedded in a script (tabs and spaces written as <t> and <b> for clarity, use literal tabs/spaces when writing):

Code:
#! /bin/ksh
typeset fIn="$1"

if [ ! -r "$fIn" ] ; then
     print -u2 "File $fIn not readable or not existing".
     exit 1
fi
sed 's/^I/_/g
     s/<t>/<b><b><b>/g
     s/^M$//
     [....]' "$fIn"

exit 0

Use the script like:

Code:
/path/to/script /some/input.file > /some/output.file

As you enter the script in vi notice that you can enter any non-printing character pressing <CTRL>-<V> and then your character, i.e <CTRL><I> literally.

A word of caution about "^M" characters: look at my take on it. You probably don't want to change any "^M" but only thos at line ends. The one on line ends you don't want to change into anything, just remove them. They are probably being left over from a DOS<->UNIX file transfer and as DOS has two characters signifying the line change and UNIX has only one you simply remove them.

I hope this helps.

bakunin
 

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LEARN ABOUT SUNOS

gucharmap

gnome-character-map(1)						   User Commands					    gnome-character-map(1)

NAME

       gnome-character-map, gucharmap - insert special characters into a document

SYNOPSIS

       gnome-character-map [--font=string]

DESCRIPTION

       The  Character Map application enables you to select characters from a character table, then combine the characters into a text string with
       standard characters. You can insert the text string that you create into other applications, such as text editor documents.

       Character Map provides accented characters, mathematical symbols, special symbols, and punctuation marks. Many of the  characters  are  not
       available on a standard keyboard.

OPTIONS

       The following options are supported:

       --font=string   Specify	the font name and point size that you want to use to display the characters in the character table, when you start
		       Character Map.

EXAMPLES

       Example 1: Launching Character Map

       example% gnome-character-map

       Example 2: Launching Character Map With Specified Font Name and Point Size

       example% gnome-character-map --font="bitstream vera sans italic 20"

EXIT STATUS

       The following exit values are returned:

       0	Application exited successfully

       >0	Application exited with failure

FILES

       The following files are used by this application:

       /usr/bin/gnome-character-map    Executable for Character Map.

ATTRIBUTES

       See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attributes:

       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |      ATTRIBUTE TYPE	     |	    ATTRIBUTE VALUE	   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |Availability		     |SUNWgnome-character-map	   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+
       |Interface stability	     |External			   |
       +-----------------------------+-----------------------------+

SEE ALSO

       Character Map Manual

       Latest version of the GNOME Desktop User Guide for your platform.

NOTES

       Written by Glynn Foster, Sun Microsystems  Inc., 2003.

SunOS 5.10							    20 Jan 2004 					    gnome-character-map(1)
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