UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

This issue has been causing me a headache all night....

I have a file, from a third party payment vendor, that contains an export of data including an order number (unique) and a payment value, amongst other data. I need to use the order numbers to integrate the database to check the order status on the database - no issues here a bit of awking gets me the right response. [FILE A]

If an order comes back in a pending state I need to run another bit of SQL that gives me more information including how much money our system took - once again no issues here. [FILE B]

Now this is the bit I can't work out.... How do I match up the value column from [FILE A] with the results of [FILE B] when [FILE A] may contain 100 records and [FILE B] may only have two. Basically, I need to take the order numbers in [FILE B] and search for the value column in [FILE A] and create [FILE C]

Any help would be a godsend!

./pjg

let's assume fileb has the order number in field #7
let's assume filea has the order number in filed #2, value in #13

Code:

awk 'FILENAME=="fileb" {arr[$7]++}
       FILENAME=="filea" {print arr[$2], $13} ' fileb filea > fileC

The join command may save you.