Shell Programming and Scripting

Hi All,

Seeking for your assistance on how to put =" " in the field.

Ex.
Input File:

Code:

this is a test1,this is test2,this is test3

Expected output

Code:

="this is a test1",="this is test2",="this is test3"

Please advise,

Thanks,
-nik

Code:

echo "this is a test1,this is test2,this is test3" | sed 's/[^,]*/="&"/g'

one way of doing this is as below on sun

Code:

echo "this is a test1,this is test2,this is test3"|sed -e 's/,/",="/g' -e 's/^/="/g' -e 's/$/"/g'

I suppose the real problem is the double quotes: they will get "eaten away" when you display the string using shell means:

Naive try, won't work:

Code:

# var="="this is a test1",="
# echo $var
=this is a test1,=

If you want the double quotes to show up, even when you display the variables content using echo or similar commands you have to escape them (prepend a backslash):

Code:

# var="=\"this is a test1\",=\""
# echo $var
="this is a test1",="

Note, that this protection works only once and the shell interpretes a line every time it uses it. If you want the protection to last through two interpretations you have to use several backslashes and - this is even more complicated - escape the first backslash itself by prepending it with another backslash. See the following for the effects of interpreting a line once, then twice, then thrice:

Code:

bakunin@ksh88 # var="\\\"\\\""
bakunin@ksh88 # echo $var
\"\"
bakunin@ksh88 # eval echo $var
""
bakunin@ksh88 # eval eval echo $var
 
bakunin@ksh88 #

I hope this helps.

bakunin