Formatting a text file to get data in exact line by line

Shell Programming and Scripting
1

I have my data something like this

    SERIAL FIRSTOCCURRENCE
NETPROTOCOL
1947430693 07/01/2009 05:16:40
FR
 
    SERIAL FIRSTOCCURRENCE
NETPROTOCOL
1947430746 07/01/2009 05:18:05
FR

I want the output as follows.

SERIAL.......................FIRSTOCCURRENCE.........................NETPROTOCOL
1947430693...................07/01/2009 05:16:40.....................FR
SERIAL.......................FIRSTOCCURRENCE.........................NETPROTOCOL
1947430746...................07/01/2009 05:18:05.....................ATM

i kept .... just for understanding..I don't want that in my final output. I searched this forum for the solution. But didn't get the solution.
Any help will be much appreciated.
-Ravi

2

Just some hints for now... the blank line is the trigger for record separation (as well as EOF). You can use awk. Collect up the data and when the trigger happens you can use printf in awk to format the output.

I'm just trying to get you to do the work, you'll learn more.

Does that help? (without me or someone writing the code for you)