awk cheatsheet

awk.md

awk - pattern-directed scanning and processing language

if you're just looking to take columns, take a look at cut

awk normally uses 'space' as a delimiter.

To force the delimiter to a 'tab':

awk -F\t '{ print $0 }' file.txt

print full line with awk

awk -F\t '{ print $0 }' file.txt

taking columns with awk

awk -F\t '{ print $1 }' file.txt awk -F\t '{ print $1"\t"$2 }' file.txt

matching on conditionals

awk -F\t '$1 == 1 { print $0 }' file.txt > matches_one.txt awk -F\t '$1 != 1 { print $0 }' file.txt > does_not_match_one.txt

take all but the first column (sed will eliminate whitespace at beginning)

awk -F\t '{ $1=""; print $0 }' file.txt | sed 's/^\s//'