sed on some fields

[TheDash]

Hi,

Is there a way to sed 's/ */ /g' for NF>4? All other fields remain same. Only fields 5 and greater are applied.

 

[PHV]

The awk way:
awk '{for(i=5;i<=NF;++i)gsub(/ */," ",$i;print}' /path/to/input

Hope This Helps, PH.
Want to get great answers to your Tek-Tips questions? Have a look at FAQ219-2884 or FAQ222-2244

 

[TheDash]

awk '{for(i=5;i<=NF;++i)gsub(/  */," ",$i;print}' /path/to/input

I put the missing ) here

awk '{for(i=5;i<=NF;++i)gsub(/  */," ",$i);print}' /path/to/input

but it hangs

 

[PHV]

And this ?
awk '{for(i=5;i<=NF;++i)gsub(/ /," ",$i);print}' /path/to/input

Hope This Helps, PH.
Want to get great answers to your Tek-Tips questions? Have a look at FAQ219-2884 or FAQ222-2244

 

[iribach]

not easy in sed, and awk compress the IFS
...
if you can get|put an other IFS as ' '
you get a chance to do it.