How to put space in a variable in unix ?

[Sammy_2]

Trying to subsitue 0 with a ' ' (2 spaces) using tr command. But when I run the script , it yields Jun 3 as oppose to Jun(2 spaces) 3.

How can I put spaces using tr or perl/or other unix command ?
Thanks

#!/bin/ksh
###++++++++++++test script ##
MONTH=`date +"%b`
DAY=`date +"%d`
FIRST_CHAR=`echo $DAY|cut -c1`
if [ $FIRST_CHAR = "0" ];then
DAY=`echo $DAY|tr -s '0' ' '`
fi
DATE="$MONTH $DAY"
echo $DATE


###++++++++++++

# ./test
Jun 3

[TwoProc]

instead of:
DAY=`echo $DAY|tr -s '0' ' '`
use:
echo ${DAY/0/}

and that will remove the offending '0'

[Sammy_2]

Thanks John. But I want to replace 0 with a blank space. Would you know how ?

[Tingli]

Do you want to use sed? Such as:

DAY=`echo $DAY | sed -e 's/0/ /g'`

[Matti_Kurkela · Accepted solution]

If your variable contains spaces, put double quotes around it when using it.

In other words:
replace the last command

echo $DATE

with

echo "$DATE"

MK

[TTr]

Your initial thought works ok. The problem is at the end in DATE="$MONTH $DAY". Any leading spaces in $DAY are lost.

Verify it by puting this after the "fi"

echo ":$DAY:"

You will see that $DAY is formatted correctly. The fix is provided by Matti.

Now you can replace the entire shell program with these two lines

DATE=`date +"%b %e"
echo "$DATE"

[Sammy_2]

You are right, TTR and Matti
I believe Tingli solutionn would work too but double quotes is simpler.
Thanks to all.

[Tingli]

Using tr can get one space only. Using sed you can get any number of spaces.

[TwoProc]

echo ${DAY/0/}

would become...

$> echo ${DAY/0/X}|tr X " "
3
and it works!

a little too late though ... :-)

[Sammy_2]

Tingli - I found that about tr not workign like sed, the hard way.
John J - I will keep your command in my notes and will come in handy.
Thanks so much