awk with column delimeters

Shell Programming and Scripting
1

Hi All,

I want to execute this

cat /etc/passwd | awk -F: '{print $1,$7}'

with a fixed column on the first and second. Say on the first I want 12 column and second with 20 column.

Example

root /usr/bin/ksh
lp /bin/false

Thanks for any comment you may add.

2

no need of cat awk can read file directly

3

what do you mean column on first and second?

4 
awk -F: '{print $1,$NF}' /etc/passwd
5

You may want to try the printf statement to produce fixed width columns. It is similar to the C and Perl language printf syntax.

awk -F: '{printf("%12s %20s\n", $1,$7)}' /etc/passwd
6

THANKS!

This is what i want

awk -F: '{printf("%12s %20s\n", $1,$7)}' /etc/passwd