Split string into array with bash/awk

Question

I have a string of the form:

  "\nFIRST_ITEM\nSECOND_ITEM\nTHIRD_ITEM\n"

When I try to use awk to split it into an array like so,

  echo "\nFIRST_ITEM\nSECOND_ITEM\nTHIRD_ITEM\n" | awk '{split($0,a,"\n")}'

The whole string just gets stored as is into a[1]. Could someone please explain why this is happening and how to fix it?

Ed Morton · Accepted Answer · 2015-10-27 23:35:07Z

1

It's not clear from your question but this MAY be what you're looking for:

$ echo "\nFIRST_ITEM\nSECOND_ITEM\nTHIRD_ITEM\n" |
    awk '{split($0,a,/\\n/); for (i=1;i in a;i++) print i, "<" a[i] ">"}'
1 <>
2 <FIRST_ITEM>
3 <SECOND_ITEM>
4 <THIRD_ITEM>
5 <>

assuming your echo outputs \n as the string \n and not a newline character.

answered Oct 27, 2015 at 23:35

Ed Morton

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whoan · Accepted Answer · 2015-10-27 23:25:01Z

0

You can do it with bash:

a="\nFIRST_ITEM\nSECOND_ITEM\nTHIRD_ITEM\n"
a=( ${a//\\n/ } )

It replaces each \n with a space.

answered Oct 27, 2015 at 23:25

whoan

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