Display a block of text with vim with offset, like with AWK

vim -e -s -c 'g/start_pattern/+1,/stop_pattern/-1 p' -cq file.txt

By using vim, you can also filter content on stdout, using vim's extra power, like search pattern offset! No more awk of course, sorry. details : -e ex mode -s silent -c 'ex command' : global + start and end pattern + offset print (p) -cq : quit

Sample Output

$cat file.txt
begin
here too
start_pattern
pipo
et
molo
font
du
ski
stop_pattern
plus
more
here

$vim -e -s -c 'g/start_pattern/+1,/stop_pattern/-1 p' -cq file.txt
pipo
et
molo
font
du
ski

By: syladmin

2009-08-26 10:22:27

vim vim block

3 Alternatives + Submit Alt

Display a block of text with AWK

I find this terribly useful for grepping through a file, looking for just a block of text. There's "grep -A # pattern file.txt" to see a specific number of lines following your pattern, but what if you want to see the whole block? Say, the output of "dmidecode" (as root): dmidecode | awk '/Battery/,/^$/' Will show me everything following the battery block up to the next block of text. Again, I find this extremely useful when I want to see whole blocks of text based on a pattern, and I don't care to see the rest of the data in output. This could be used against the '/etc/securetty/user' file on Unix to find the block of a specific user. It could be used against VirtualHosts or Directories on Apache to find specific definitions. The scenarios go on for any text formatted in a block fashion. Very handy.
This is sample output - yours may be different.
95

awk '/start_pattern/,/stop_pattern/' file.txt

atoponce · 2009-03-28 14:28:59 28
Display a block of text with AWK
This is sample output - yours may be different.
7

sed -n /start_pattern/,/stop_pattern/p file.txt

pipping · 2009-10-24 16:35:39 8
Display a block of text: multi-line grep with perl

-n reads input, line by line, in a loop sending to $_ Equivalent to while () { mycode } -e execute the following quoted string (i.e. do the following on the same line as the perl command) the elipses .. operator behaves like a range, remembering the state from line to line.
This is sample output - yours may be different.
2

perl -ne 'print if /start_pattern/../stop_pattern/' file.txt

SunKing2 · 2018-07-24 03:23:12 344

What Others Think

Through this website, you can learn so many commands that make your tasks easier. Good to know about helpful hints the one discussed here that is used for displaying a block of text with vim with offset, like with AWK. The sample output helps us to understand more about it.

Alyssalauren · 136 weeks and 5 days ago

rahimhh21 · 109 weeks and 4 days ago

Perfecthomepugs · 101 weeks and 1 day ago

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medicalhouse25 · 79 weeks and 1 day ago

pugpuppies95 · 63 weeks and 1 day ago

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