[regexp in the shell]

[Matt Graham]

"Morris, Alex" <alex.morris@jnli.com> wrote:
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>	Attachment:  
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...plain text, man, plain text.

> I'm using the ksh shell and have a problem.  I have a variable in one of my
> scripts, and I need to extract a few characters from the variable and store
> it in another variable (preferably without using a temp file).
> 
> The basic format of the variable is:
> 
> IMPLEMNTATION  ----------------------- xxxxxxxx!yyyyy 1 record(s) selected.
> 
> I'm trying to extract that "xxxxxxxx" part.  The number of dashes, "-", is
> not static.  The number of "x"'s is not static.  And the number of "y"'s is
> not static.  I figure that I can search through the variable and pull out
> everything between "----- " and "!", but I don't know how to search through
> the variable...
> 
> Any idea how to do this, or what function to investigate? 

sed?

echo " BOOGA ------ joebob ! foo records selected" | sed -e 's/\!.*$//'
-e 's/^.*-//'

...returns "joebob" which is what I think you want this thing to do.  Just
echo the variable and pipe echo's output through the sed, then use backticks
to assign the result to a new variable?  I'm sure there's a more efficient way
to do this.  It might involve turning the shell script into a Perl script, but
that would probably be a Good Thing since doing complex stuff in shell is a
PITA.  HTH,


-- 
Matt G / Dances With Crows
There is no Darkness in Eternity
But only Light too dim for us to see

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