Consults about ux2dos

[Miguel Hernández]

Hi to all:

Somebody knows why appears ^Z character at the end of the file when using ux2dos command??

I see in ASCII tables that ^Z is "subsitute"

Thanks in advance

[renarios]

Hi Miguel,

Can you provide some more info?

Cheers,

Renarios

[Miguel Hernández]

One example:

ad01:#more prueba
sl4knmgadf
hbsdflkhnqsg

qlklgqsdfklmg
fdgnsdnsdfgasdg pofjg4kdsmf `lkh4fg

lkfmgsaklqdmg
fdgjklnadqkfjgnsd


lkjnqagnfds

ad01:#ux2dos prueba >salida.txt

ad01:#more salida.txt
sl4knmgadf
hbsdflkhnqsg

qlklgqsdfklmg
fdgnsdnsdfgasdg pofjg4kdsmf `lkh4fg

lkfmgsaklqdmg
fdgjklnadqkfjgnsd


lkjnqagnfds
ad01:#ux2dos prueba >salida.txt
ad01:#more salida.txt
sl4knmgadf
hbsdflkhnqsg

qlklgqsdfklmg
fdgnsdnsdfgasdg pofjg4kdsmf `lkh4fg

lkfmgsaklqdmg
fdgjklnadqkfjgnsd


lkjnqagnfds
^Z


why appears ^Z??

Thanks

[Pete Randall]

The dos and unix file formats differ in how they treat end-of-line characters and the ux2dos command is designed to make a unix file readable by Dos, as the dos2ux command is designed to make a Dos file readable by unix. Basically the two commands either add or remove end-of-line characters.

If you are seeing ^Z after each line, then you probably didn't need to convert the file - try unconverting it with dos2ux. If there is only one ^Z character at the very end of the file, that's a new one on me.


Pete

[Miguel Hernández]

Hi Pete:

I see that dos2ux left ^M character at the end of the line, but this other...

Can it be problem of the terminal?

[Bill Hassell · Accepted solution]

CTRL-Z is perfectly normal for DOS ASCII files. Although MS defines (and changes) it's own standards for file formats, the basic format for ASCII files is CR+LF at the end of every line and CTRL-Z at the end of the file. You won't see the CR+LF and CTRL-Z in a Windows box as they are in the normal format. But in HP-UX, the format is not recognized by programs that use ASCII files (such as vi). If you brought over some mainframe files, the differences would be enormous.

So dos2ux and ux2dos translate ASCII files both ways. Note that CTRL-Z has been optional for many years but for backwards compatibility, ux2dos will continue to add the CTRL-Z. See this reference:

http://www.cygwin.com/ml/cygwin/1997-08/msg00189.html

[Miguel Hernández]

Thanks Bill, that is everything what needed to know.


Thanks to all.