UNIX for Dummies Questions & Answers

How would I find three different fields in a data file such as first name, last name, credit card number in a particular file?

Thanks in advance for your help

It depends entirely on the format of the data. There is a 93.2% chance that awk will do the job going by the type of posts we get here.

Could someone please give me an example of the string of code I would use to obtain this data? I have no clue how to use AWK. I have been reading but have not found my answer yet.

As stated by porter, it would depend on the input file.
Something to get you started though:

Code:

cat "yourfile.txt" | awk 'BEGIN {FS = ":"; OFS = " " }  { print $1,$2,$3 }'

Substitute the thing that seperates the fields where I've picked a : character. The OFS bit is choosing how you want it displayed.
The $1,$2,$3 is selecting which fields you want - should be pretty clear.

If your file is seperated by tabs or spaces, you can leave out the "BEGIN {FS = ":"; OFS = " " }" part as that's what it does by default.