Passing awk variables to bash variables

Shell Programming and Scripting
1

Trying to do so

echo "111:222:333" |awk -F: '{system("export TESTO=" $2)}'

But it doesn't work

2

You are passing them into a subshell, which does not affect the outer shell.

export TESTO=`echo "111:222:333" |awk -F: '{print $2}'`

or all shell:

echo "111:222:333" | (
IFS="$IFS:"
read x TESTO y
IFS="${IFS%:}" 
. . .
) # bash needs you to process inside a subshell, but ksh does not, uses the parent shell as the final shell on the pipe.
3

You can't pass awk variables to the shell directly. You could use an intermediate file or a (named) pipe, or you can use command substitution

TESTO=$(echo "111:222:333" | awk -F: '{print $2}')

or process substitution in bash/ksh93/zsh

read TESTO < <(echo "111:222:333" | awk -F: '{print $2}')

--
or a regular pipe in ksh and zsh only

echo "111:222:333" | awk -F: '{print $2}' | read TESTO

(also works with bash 4 with shopt -s lastpipe in a non-interactive shell)