Get 1st and LAST char

[Keith Floyd]

Hi

I am trying to get the first and last char from a string (variable length)

Does anyone know the way to do it ??

Thanks

Keith

[James R. Ferguson · Accepted solution]

Keith:

To get the first and the last character of a string, use the substr and length functions of awk.

# S=abcdef
# F=`echo $S|awk '{print substr($0,1,1)}'`
# L=`echo $S|awk '{print substr($0,length($0),1)}'`

where S is your variable string,
and F is the first character returned,
and L is the last character of the string.

...JRF...

[wyan lowe]

could also try sed

s=abcdef
f=echo "$s" | sed -n "s/^(.).*/1/p"
l=echo "$s" | sed -n "s/.*(.)$/1/p"


could try using [a-zA-Z] instead of just "." if matching for a letter
"." matches any single character - except newline, I think...

[curt larson]

you could use a more modern shell version then the '88 version that HP supplies for /usr/bin/sh and ksh. Such as:

#!/usr/dt/bin/dtksh
string=abcdef

F=${string:0:1}
L=${string:$(( ${#string} - 1 )):1}

and if you'd prefer just calling awk or sed once

echo $string |
awk '{
print substr($0,1,1) " " substr($0,length($0),1);
}' |
read F L

echo $string |
sed -n "s/^\(.\)*\(.\)$/\1 \2/p" |
read F L