I have a file with many lines in each line there are many columns(fields) separated by blank " " the numbers of columns in each line are different I want to remove the first two columns how to?
You can do it with cut
:
cut -d " " -f 3- input_filename > output_filename
Explanation:
cut
: invoke the cut command-d " "
: use a single space as the delimiter (cut
uses TAB by default)-f
: specify fields to keep3-
: all the fields starting with field 3input_filename
: use this file as the input> output_filename
: write the output to this file.Alternatively, you can do it with awk
:
awk '{$1=""; $2=""; sub(" ", " "); print}' input_filename > output_filename
Explanation:
awk
: invoke the awk command$1=""; $2="";
: set field 1 and 2 to the empty stringsub(...);
: clean up the output fields because fields 1 & 2 will still be delimited by " "print
: print the modified lineinput_filename > output_filename
: same as above.