[SOLVED] awk print $0 delete extra spaces problem

fantasy1215 · 07-08-2012, 09:34 PM

My awk version is:GNU Awk 3.1.5

I have a data file named data1, here is the data of file data1:

Code:

hereis[     ]mydata
Ijustw[     ]ant_to_see_it_intact

between [ and ] there are 5 spaces.
when I use the bash code below, it works fine, it just prints the lines as the data file:

Code:

cat data1|awk '{print $0}'

But when I use this code, it deletes the extra spaces:

Code:

cat data1 | while read line
do
    newline=$(echo  ${line}|awk '{print $0 }' )
    echo "${newline}"
done

the output is below, only one space between [ and ], not 5 spaces:

Code:

hereis[ ]mydata
Ijustw[ ]ant_to_see_it_intact

Please help understanding the behavior, thanks in advance.

grail · 07-08-2012, 10:59 PM

hmmm ... I am unable to repeat your results using your data and example

rknichols · 07-08-2012, 11:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by fantasy1215

Code:

cat data1 | while read line
do
    newline=$(echo  ${line}|awk '{print $0 }' )
    echo "${newline}"
done

In that echo command, you need to quote the ${line} argument, else the shell will perform word splitting on the result and present each word as a separate argument to echo.

Code:

newline=$(echo  "${line}"|awk '{print $0 }' )

fantasy1215 · 07-08-2012, 11:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rknichols

In that echo command, you need to quote the ${line} argument, else the shell will perform word splitting on the result and present each word as a separate argument to echo.

Code:

newline=$(echo  "${line}"|awk '{print $0 }' )

Thanks very much, you unblock my mind. I've learned a lesson. Thanks again.

grail · 07-09-2012, 03:42 AM

Good pick up rk ... I had to type it into my vm and must have been on autopilot as I had placed the variable in quotes