[vsemaska]

What is the grep command(s) that you are using? Mine:

grep -i "\b12\b.*nov.*2007" myfile

doesn't match those lines.

[eeezeepeezee]

heres the code in got for the grep im actually using a few variables in place of the strings

grep -i "\b$VAR1\B.*$VAR2.*$VAR3" myfile

is it because it cant take those variables?

[vsemaska]

It must be how you're setting those variables. I tried it and it works:

solt:/root> ./a.bash
#!/bin/bash -vx

VAR1="12"
+ VAR1=12
VAR2="nov"
+ VAR2=nov
VAR3="2007"
+ VAR3=2007
grep -i "\b$VAR1\b.*$VAR2.*$VAR3" myfile
+ grep -i '\b12\b.*nov.*2007' myfile
123456 12 NOV 2007
123.123.123.123 12 Nov 2007 14:12:08
123.123.123.123 12 Nov 2007 14:12:08

Put a '-vx' at the end of the 1st line like I did to see what the script is doing.

I just noticed you have a \B instead of \b in your pattern

\b$VAR1\B instead of \b$VAR1\b

That might be the problem.

[khafa]

and given the fact that the pattern is known (12 + one space + nov + one space + 2007)
i think that it can be as simple as

grep -i "12 nov 2007" myfile

[eeezeepeezee]

nope, afraid none of the solutions work for me

the only way i can think of doing it is to awk that specific column then search for "12" then redirect the output to another file, and again grep the contents

But of course that would be a very long and inefficient way of solving this problem.

[HROAdmin26]

not too sure what that does but thanks anyway

man grep

Google: grep


If you are searching for a literal 12 with nothing on either side:

grep " 12 " myfile | grep -i nov | grep 2007 > results

[khafa]

Originally Posted by eeezeepeezee

nope, afraid none of the solutions work for me

the only way i can think of doing it is to awk that specific column then search for "12" then redirect the output to another file, and again grep the contents

But of course that would be a very long and inefficient way of solving this problem.

are you sure none of the solutions work ?
please tell us why these solutions dont work

i think there is a misunderstanding between you and us here. can you give us the fields in the records of the file (are all the records of the same type?)

and tell us what you want to search. because if you just need "12 nov 2007" i dont see the reason why it does not work

sorry if im missing something in your problem description

[seanmckinney]

If I am up a gum tree, sorry, but I am just getting back into this, would

gawk ' {if (($2 ~/12/ ) && ($3 ~/Nov/) && ($4 ~/2007/)) print$0} ' < inputfilename > outputfilename


not work? It does for me BUT watch the case sense of the letters in nov.
If what you want to scan is the result of another progamme the couldn't you just pipe the output to the above gawk script
eg
commandxyz | gawk ' {if (($2 ~/12/ ) && ($3 ~/NOV/) && ($4 ~/2007/)) print$0} ' > outputfilename

Ummm, with just spaces between 12 and Nov and 2007

grep "12 Nov 2007"

also works for me but that could just be a fluke.

[scm]

Originally Posted by HROAdmin26

If you are searching for a literal 12 with nothing on either side:

grep " 12 " myfile | grep -i nov | grep 2007 > results

That's not a literal 12 with nothing on either side, that's a literal 12 with a space character on each side.

[HROAdmin26]

Originally Posted by scm

That's not a literal 12 with nothing on either side, that's a literal 12 with a space character on each side.

Golf clap for you. Does this not pull out the lines that contain " 12 ", "Nov", and "2007", as listed in the original example:

123456 12 Nov Sun 2007
123456 14 Nov Sun 2006
123456 12 Nov Sun 2007

The 'problem' was with the 12 searches pulling other numbers such as 1234 or 34125. My comment of "nothing" on either side referred to no other number or letter. Yes, this is encoded as an ASCII space character. Besides the semantics, it changes the results not.