skipping lines after pattern match

[tafkid]

Hi I'm an awk newbie and I need help with a problem.
I have some files in which I need to match a certain pattern, skip two lines and then replace the current line (after skipping) with something e.g.
...
line a ("tom") <-- tom is the pattern to be found
line b blah blah <-- to be skipped
line c blah blah <-- to be skipped
line d ("finn") <-- replace finn with sawyer
...

Please note that there are lines before and after line a and d respectively. Also, I cannot go directly to finn since I do not know the value before hand (the double quotes are in the file). Any help is much appreciated.

 

[feherke]

Hi

awk '/tom/{l=NR}l&&NR==l+3{sub(/finn/,"sawyer")}1' /input/file > /output/file

Tested with [tt]gawk[/tt] and [tt]mawk[/tt].

Feherke.

http://rootshell.be/~feherke/

 

[PHV]

What have you tried so far and where in your code are you stuck ?

BTW, where is "sawyer" coming from ?

Hope This Helps, PH.
FAQ219-2884
FAQ181-2886

 

[tafkid]

Thanks feherke it worked like a charm after some modification.