Shell Programming and Scripting

fname 
lname
address
hiredate
dept

fname 
lname
address
hiredate
dept

fname                    fname
lname                     lname
address                  address
hiredate                 hiredate
dept                      dept

#!/bin/bash
N=0
LOOP=1
WIDTH="%20s"
while [[ "${LOOP}" -ne 0 ]]
do
        for VAR in FNAME LNAME ADDR HIRE DEPT
        do
                read ${VAR}[$N] || LOOP=0
        done

        read BLANK
        ((N++))
done < datafile

(       printf "${WIDTH}" "${FNAME[@]}"     ;       echo
        printf "${WIDTH}" "${LNAME[@]}"     ;       echo
        printf "${WIDTH}" "${ADDR[@]}"      ;       echo
        printf "${WIDTH}" "${HIRE[@]}"      ;       echo
        printf "${WIDTH}" "${DEPT[@]}"      ;       echo ) > outfile

               fname              fname2              fname3
               lname              lname2              lname3
             address            address2            address3
            hiredate           hiredate2           hiredate3
                dept               dept2               dept3

$ awk 'BEGIN{RS="";FS="\n";}{for(i=1;i<=NF;i++){a[i]=a[i]" "$i;c++ }}END{for(i=1;i<=c;i++)print a[i]}' file

awk '{a[NR%6]=a[NR%6]?a[NR%6] FS $1:$1}END {for (i=1;i<6;i++) print a[i]}' infile

awk -v x=1 'NF>0{a[x]=a[x]"     "$0;x++;}NF==0{x=1;}END{for(i=1;i<=5;i++) print a[i]}' urfile