How to join multiple lines into single line?

[Phuc Nguyen_1]

I have a case statement that appends a line of string to a file, and each case appends in a new line. I need to join all the lines into a single line with a space and the valuse of $Z (a pre-define variable) in between every line. The number of line is unknow because this will depends on the number of time the while loop run for the case, and the number of characters of each line is also unknown.

I know that this can be done with sed or awk, but I am newbie so not very familiar with these utilities. Any help is appreciated.

Thank you

[Steven Sim Kok Leong]

Hi,

If you don't like perl, then use the echo command to do the trick:

# echo `cat $MULTIPLE_LINES_TO_JOIN_INTO_ONE`

$MULTIPLE_LINES_TO_JOIN_INTO_ONE is a variable which contains the filename to cat and subsequently contents echo'ed.

Hope this helps. Regards.

Steven Sim Kok Leong

[SHABU KHAN]

Hi,

Do this:

sed 's/$/stringyouwouldliketoinsert/' testfile | tr -s "\n" " " > testfile.out

Will insert the variable at the end of the each line and will strip all new lines to one space.

Hope this helps !

P.S. cat filename | tr -d "\n" will strip all new lines in a file
Thanks,
Shabu

[John Carr_2]

Hi

the last tr command does not work correctly on control characters I think it should have been

cat filename | tr -d '[\012]' > newfile

regards
John

[John Carr_2]

Hi

just checked it and this works

#
# cat /tmp/testfile
date
date
date
date
date
date
date
#
# sed 's/$/ my_defined_variable /' /tmp/testfile | tr -d '[\012]'
date my_defined_variable date my_defined_variable date my_defined_variable date my_defined_variable date my_defined_variable date my_defined_variable date my_defined_variable #
#

cheers
John.

[Phuc Nguyen_1]

Thanks to those that responded.
Mr. Carr and Mr. Khan solution accomplish 90% of what I wanted to do, but the value of my pre-define variable did not get inserted into the outfile. Example, Z="myvaluehere", when I do:
%sed 's/$/O/' ...
the O gets inserted in the outfile, not the string myvaluehere.
Perhaphs I am doing something wrong, maybe my syntax is incorrect?

[Phuc Nguyen_1]

I made a typo in to previous post.
Correction:
Example, Z="myvaluehere", when I do:
%sed 's/$/Z/' ...
the Z gets inserted in the outfile, not the string myvaluehere.

[H.Merijn Brand (procura · Accepted solution]

Interpolation issues: single-m vs. double quotes

Change
% sed 's/$/Z/' ...
To
% sed 's/$/'"$Z"'/' ...

[SHABU KHAN]

Hi,

Procura's posting should help solve the remaining 10% of your problem.

PS. N/A for this one..
Thanks,
Shabu