Re: IFS system variable

[Ian Macdonald]

On Thu 14 Feb 2002 at 04:24:39 +0000, you wrote:

> I tried:
> export IFS=:
> 
> grep eric /etc/passwd |awk '{print $5}'
> 
> still not working. I'm just trying to print 5th field from /etc/passwd 
> that will show users full name.
>
> Maybe You know different way of doing this, if so please let me know.
> Thanks again for Your time.

How about changing the field separator in awk, rather than in bash?

You could also so away with the grep while you're at it:

    awk '{FS=":"; if ($5 ~ /eric/) {print $5}}' /etc/passwd

Ian
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