Shell Programming and Scripting

Hey guys..
New in linux scripting and need some help on some scripting with history command. I managed to export the command history into a file and now i'm trying to select from that file some specific commands that were made in a certain period. Here's what i got so far

Code:

        echo -n "Initial time in format HH:MM:  "
        read initdate
        echo -n "End time in format HH:MM:  "
        read sfdate
            awk '{  if ("$initdate" < $3) print $1,"\t",$2,"\t",$3,"\t",$4}'  hist_file.log

where $3 is the time in HH:MM format.
Apparently there is some error when trying to make a string comparison between my $initdate variable and the time inside the log file because it prints all my file and when i make a comparison like

Code:

if("11:00"<$3)

it works perfect. Anyone has any idea what i should do?

Code:

        echo -n "Initial time in format HH:MM:  "
        read initdate
        echo -n "End time in format HH:MM:  "
        read sfdate
            awk -v mydate=$initdate '{  if (mydate < $3) {print $1,"\t",$2,"\t",$3,"\t",$4 }}'  hist_file.log

try the above for starters.

Yes i believe it works.. Also tried on my other variables which i did not posted. note: you have to use -v for each variable you may want to import into awk script. Thanks a lot, you saved me from some heavy time of searching the web