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More info:<br />
I would like to replace the nth column with a single character such as 'A' in all lines.
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I am getting a syntax error on the 2nd pipe.
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what syntax error are you getting, and in what way is it on the 2nd pipe?
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awk: OFS=|{$3=&quot;A&quot;}1<br />
awk: &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; &nbsp; ^ syntax error<br />
<br />
This is exactly what is returned.
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Hi soccerplayer,<br />
<br />
Could you please copy &amp;&nbsp;paste your session (i.e. the <u>command</u> + error message). &nbsp;ozo's solution works for me.<br />
<br />
Also, what flavour of Linux are you running this in?
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Did your command include the spaces?
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I have Linux 2.6.18-348. I typed:<br />
<br />
awk -F'|'-v OFS='|''{$3=&quot;A&quot;}1' Myfile.dat &gt;&nbsp;junk.dat
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I am not sure about the spaces though. I added a space between ' and -v and that gave me a different error.
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BTW soccerplayer, when you originally got the error, was that the result of a copy/paste of ozo's solution, or did you type it manually?
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I typed the solution manually. The 2nd space was the issue. It is hard to tell if it is a space.
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Thanks for the points, soccerplayer, although I think ozo's effort was worth a lot more than mine, especially since he did ask if your command included spaces (though I didn't spot that comment until after I'd posted mine - sorry ozo).<br />
<br />
<i>I typed the solution manually.</i><br />
In future, I would recommend you copy/paste solutions wherever possible. &nbsp;This not only saves typing time, but debugging time, as you have seen above.<br />
<br />
<i>&gt; The 2nd space was the issue. It is hard to tell if it is a space.</i><br />
I think you'll find that both spaces were needed, coz if you omit the one before the &quot;-v&quot;, it will fail with a different error.<br />
<br />
If you want to remove a space, you could change:<br />
&nbsp; ...Myfile.dat &gt;&nbsp;junk.dat<br />
to:<br />
&nbsp; ...Myfile.dat &gt;junk.dat<br />
which is a commonly accepted alternative coding style...I think.<br />
<br />
Later.<br />
tel2
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<div class="content wysiwyg-content">
I have several files, one of them is as follows:<br />
<br />
A|2|Fghg|2|12/31/2013 01:00 PM\r\n<br />
B|3|Ghkf|2|11/23/2012 02:00 PM\r\n<br />
<br />
I would like to replace the nth column with a different value. For the example above, n=3.<br />
There are no end-of-file terminators and there are DOS record delimiters.<br />
<br />
Any help appreciated.
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I have several files, one of them is as follows:

A|2|Fghg|2|12/31/2013 01:00 PM\r\n
B|3|Ghkf|2|11/23/2012 02:00 PM\r\n

I would like to replace the nth column with a different value. For the example above, n=3.
There are no end-of-file terminators and there are DOS record delimiters.

Any help appreciated.

How to replace nth column in a file

The term 'shell' refers to a general class of text-based command interpreters most often associated with the UNIX and Linux operating systems. Popular shells include Bourne, Debian Almquist (dash), Korn (ksh), Bourne Again (bash) and the C shell family (csh). Some view the DOS 'cmd' prompt as a minimal shell of sorts. It is also possible to install Cygwin on Windows and emulate a full Unix environment with complete shell capabilities. Terminal emulators, such as xterm, GNOME Terminal and OS X Terminal, can be used to access shell.

Shell Scripting

Kernel programming for Linux operating systems can be done with many different languages; C, C++, Python, Perl and Java, which are some of the most common languages used.There are also many different varieties of Linux, such as Ubuntu, Fedora and OpenSUSE.