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GAWK (1)

pattern scanning and processing language

SYNOPSIS

    gawk [ POSIX or GNU style options ] -f program-file [ -\^- ] file .\^.\^. gawk [ POSIX or GNU style options ] [ -\^- ] program-text file .\^.\^.

DESCRIPTION

    Gawk is the GNU Project's implementation of the AWK programming language. It conforms to the definition of the language in the \*(PX 1003.2 Command Language And Utilities Standard. This version in turn is based on the description in The AWK Programming Language by Aho, Kernighan, and Weinberger, with the additional features found in the System V Release 4 version of \*(UX awk . Gawk also provides more recent Bell Labs awk extensions, and some GNU-specific extensions.

    The command line consists of options to gawk itself, the AWK program text (if not supplied via the -f or -\^-file options), and values to be made available in the ARGC and ARGV pre-defined AWK variables.

OPTION FORMAT

    Gawk options may be either the traditional \*(PX one letter options, or the GNU style long options. \*(PX options start with a single ``-'', while long options start with ``-\^-''. Long options are provided for both GNU-specific features and for \*(PX mandated features.

    Following the \*(PX standard, gawk -specific options are supplied via arguments to the -W option. Multiple -W options may be supplied Each -W option has a corresponding long option, as detailed below. Arguments to long options are either joined with the option by an = sign, with no intervening spaces, or they may be provided in the next command line argument. Long options may be abbreviated, as long as the abbreviation remains unique.

OPTIONS

    Gawk accepts the following options.

    -F fs

    -\^-field-separator fs

      Use fs for the input field separator (the value of the FS predefined variable).

    -v var\^=\^val

    -\^-assign var\^=\^val

      Assign the value val , to the variable var , before execution of the program begins. Such variable values are available to the BEGIN block of an AWK program.

    -f program-file

    -\^-file program-file

      Read the AWK program source from the file program-file , instead of from the first command line argument. Multiple -f (or -\^-file ) options may be used.

    -mf NNN

    -mr NNN

      Set various memory limits to the value NNN . The f flag sets the maximum number of fields, and the r flag sets the maximum record size. These two flags and the -m option are from the Bell Labs research version of \*(UX awk . They are ignored by gawk , since gawk has no pre-defined limits.

    -W traditional

    -W compat

    -\^-traditional

    -\^-compat

      Run in compatibility mode. In compatibility mode, gawk behaves identically to \*(UX awk ; none of the GNU-specific extensions are recognized. The use of -\^-traditional is preferred over the other forms of this option. See GNU EXTENSIONS below, for more information.

    -W copyleft

    -W copyright

    -\^-copyleft

    -\^-copyright

      Print the short version of the GNU copyright information message on the standard output, and exits successfully.

    -W help

    -W usage

    -\^-help

    -\^-usage

      Print a relatively short summary of the available options on the standard output. (Per the GNU Coding Standards these options cause an immediate, successful exit.)

    -W lint

    -\^-lint

      Provide warnings about constructs that are dubious or non-portable to other AWK implementations.

    -W lint-old

    -\^-lint-old

      Provide warnings about constructs that are not portable to the original version of Unix awk .