How can I extract a predetermined range of lines from a text file on Unix

Question

I have a  23000 line SQL dump containing several databases worth of data  I need to extract a certain section of this file  i e  the data for a single database  and place it in a new file  I know both the start and end line numbers of the data that I want   Does anyone know a Unix command  or series of commands  to extract all lines from a file between say line 16224 and 16482 and then redirect them into a new file

User · Answer

I was about to post the head tail trick  but actually I d probably just fire up emacs   -    esc-x goto-line ret 16224 mark  ctrl-space  esc-x goto-line ret 16482 esc-w   open the new output file  ctl-y save  Let s me see what s happening

User · Answer

Even we can do this to check at command line   cat filename sed  n1 n2 d   gt  abc txt   For Example   cat foo pl sed  100 200 d   gt  abc txt

User · Answer

I was about to post the head tail trick  but actually I d probably just fire up emacs   -    esc-x goto-line ret 16224 mark  ctrl-space  esc-x goto-line ret 16482 esc-w   open the new output file  ctl-y save  Let s me see what s happening

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482 p  orig-data-file  gt  new-file   Where 16224 16482 are the start line number and end line number  inclusive   This is 1-indexed   -n suppresses echoing the input as output  which you clearly don t want  the numbers indicate the range of lines to make the following command operate on  the command p prints out the relevant lines

User · Answer

Quite simple using head tail  head -16482 in sql   tail -258  gt  out sql  using sed  sed -n  16224 16482p  in sql  gt  out sql  using awk  awk  NR gt  16224 amp  amp NR lt  16482  in sql  gt  out sql

User · Answer

Just benchmarking 3 solutions given above  that works to me   awk sed  quot head tail quot   Credits on the 3 solutions goes to    boxxar  avandeursen  wds  manveru  sibaz  SOFe  fedorqui  SO stop harming   Robin A  Meade   I m using a huge file I find in my server    wc fo2debug 1 log    10421186    19448208 38795491134 fo2debug 1 log  38 Gb in 10 4 million lines  And yes  I have a logrotate problem        Make your bets   Getting 256 lines from the beginning of the file    time sed -n  1001 1256p 1256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 003s user    0m0 000s sys     0m0 004s    time head -1256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  1001   wc -l 256  real    0m0 003s user    0m0 006s sys     0m0 000s    time awk  NR  1001  NR  1256  NR  1256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 002s user    0m0 004s sys     0m0 000s  Awk won  Technical tie in second place between sed and  quot head tail quot    Getting 256 lines at the end of the first third of the file    time sed -n  3473001 3473256p 3473256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 265s user    0m0 242s sys     0m0 024s    time head -3473256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  3473001   wc -l 256  real    0m0 308s user    0m0 313s sys     0m0 145s    time awk  NR  3473001  NR  3473256  NR  3473256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 393s user    0m0 326s sys     0m0 068s  Sed won  Followed by  quot head tail quot  and  finally  awk   Getting 256 lines at the end of the second third of the file    time sed -n  6947001 6947256p 6947256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l A256  real    0m0 525s user    0m0 462s sys     0m0 064s    time head -6947256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  6947001   wc -l 256  real    0m0 615s user    0m0 488s sys     0m0 423s    time awk  NR  6947001  NR  6947256  NR  6947256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 779s user    0m0 650s sys     0m0 130s  Same results  Sed won  Followed by  quot head tail quot  and  finally  awk   Getting 256 lines near the end of the file    time sed -n  10420001 10420256p 10420256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    1m50 017s user    0m12 735s sys     0m22 926s    time head -10420256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  10420001   wc -l 256  real    1m48 269s user    0m42 404s sys     0m51 015s    time awk  NR  10420001  NR  10420256  NR  10420256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    1m49 106s user    0m12 322s sys     0m18 576s  And suddenly  a twist   quot Head tail quot  won  Followed by awk and  finally  sed    some hours later     Sorry guys  My analysis above ends up being an example of a basic flaw in doing an analysis  The flaw is not knowing in depth the resources used for the analysis  In this case  I used a log file to analyze the performance of a search for a certain number of lines within it  Using 3 different techniques  searches were made at different points in the file  comparing the performance of the techniques at each point and checking whether the results varied depending on the point in the file where the search was made  My mistake was to assume that there was a certain homogeneity of content in the log file  The reality is that long lines appear more frequently at the end of the file  Thus  the apparent conclusion that longer searches  closer to the end of the file  are better with a given technique  may be biased  In fact  this technique may be better when dealing with longer lines  What remains to be confirmed

User · Answer

You could use  vi  and then the following command    16224 16482w  tmp some-file   Alternatively    cat file   head -n 16482   tail -n 258   EDIT - Just to add explanation  you use head -n 16482 to display first 16482 lines then use tail -n 258 to get last 258 lines out of the first output

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482 p  orig-data-file  gt  new-file   Where 16224 16482 are the start line number and end line number  inclusive   This is 1-indexed   -n suppresses echoing the input as output  which you clearly don t want  the numbers indicate the range of lines to make the following command operate on  the command p prints out the relevant lines

User · Answer

Standing on the shoulders of boxxar  I like this   sed -n   lt first line gt   p  lt last line gt q  input   e g   sed -n  16224  p 16482q  input   The   means  last line   so the first command makes sed print all lines starting with line 16224 and the second command makes sed quit after printing line 16428   Adding 1 for the q-range in boxxar s solution does not seem to be necessary    I like this variant because I don t need to specify the ending line number twice  And I measured that using   does not have detrimental effects on performance

User · Answer

I wrote a small bash script that you can run from your command line  so long as you update your PATH to include its directory  or you can place it in a directory that is already contained in the PATH    Usage    pinch filename start-line end-line     bin bash   Display line number ranges of a file to the terminal    Usage    pinch filename start-line end-line   By Evan J  Coon  FILENAME  1 START  2 END  3  ERROR   PINCH ERROR      Check that the number of arguments is 3 if      -lt 3    then     echo   ERROR Need three arguments  Filename Start-line End-line      exit 1 fi    Check that the file exists  if     -f   FILENAME     then     echo -e   ERROR File does not exist   n t FILENAME      exit 1 fi    Check that start-line is not greater than end-line if     START  -gt   END     then     echo -e   ERROR Start line is greater than End line       exit 1 fi    Check that start-line is positive  if     START  -lt 0    then     echo -e   ERROR Start line is less than 0       exit 1 fi    Check that end-line is positive  if     END  -lt 0    then     echo -e   ERROR End line is less than 0       exit 1 fi  NUMOFLINES   wc -l  lt    FILENAME      Check that end-line is not greater than the number of lines in the file  if     END  -gt   NUMOFLINES     then     echo -e   ERROR End line is greater than number of lines in file       exit 1 fi    The distance from the end of the file to end-line ENDDIFF     NUMOFLINES - END       For larger files  this will run more quickly  If the distance from the   end of the file to the end-line is less than the distance from the   start of the file to the start-line  then start pinching from the   bottom as opposed to the top  if     START  -lt   ENDDIFF     then      lt    FILENAME  head -n  END   tail -n   START else      lt    FILENAME  tail -n   START   head -n     END-START 1    fi    Success exit 0

User · Answer

print section of file based on line numbers  sed -n  16224  16482p                  method 1  sed  16224 16482 d                    method 2

User · Answer

Quite simple using head tail  head -16482 in sql   tail -258  gt  out sql  using sed  sed -n  16224 16482p  in sql  gt  out sql  using awk  awk  NR gt  16224 amp  amp NR lt  16482  in sql  gt  out sql

User · Answer

Standing on the shoulders of boxxar  I like this   sed -n   lt first line gt   p  lt last line gt q  input   e g   sed -n  16224  p 16482q  input   The   means  last line   so the first command makes sed print all lines starting with line 16224 and the second command makes sed quit after printing line 16428   Adding 1 for the q-range in boxxar s solution does not seem to be necessary    I like this variant because I don t need to specify the ending line number twice  And I measured that using   does not have detrimental effects on performance

User · Answer

I wrote a Haskell program called splitter that does exactly this  have a read through my release blog post   You can use the program as follows     cat somefile   splitter 16224-16482   And that is all that there is to it  You will need Haskell to install it  Just     cabal install splitter   And you are done  I hope that you find this program useful

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p   lt  dump sql

User · Answer

I was looking for an answer to this but I had to end up writing my own code which worked  None of the answers above were satisfactory  Consider you have very large file and have certain line numbers that you want to print out but the numbers are not in order  You can do the following  My relatively large file for letter in  a  k    do echo  letter  done   cat -n  gt  myfile txt  1  a  2  b  3  c  4  d  5  e  6  f  7  g  8  h  9  i 10  j 11  k  Specific line numbers I want  shuf -i 1-11 -n 4  gt  line numbers I want txt  10  11  4  9  To print these line numbers  do the following  awk   system  quot head myfile txt -n  quot   0  quot    tail -n 1 quot     line numbers I want txt What the above does is to head the n line then take the last line using tail If you want your line numbers in order  sort   is -n numeric sort  first then get the lines  cat line numbers I want txt   sort -n   awk   system  quot head myfile txt -n  quot   0  quot    tail -n 1 quot      4  d  9  i 10  j 11  k

User · Answer

print section of file based on line numbers  sed -n  16224  16482p                  method 1  sed  16224 16482 d                    method 2

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p 16483q  filename  gt  newfile   From the sed manual      p -        Print out the pattern space  to the standard output   This command is usually only used in conjunction with the -n command-line option       n -       If auto-print is not disabled  print the pattern space  then  regardless  replace the pattern space with the next line of input  If   there is no more input then sed exits without processing any more   commands       q -   Exit sed without processing any more commands or input    Note that the current pattern space is printed if auto-print is not disabled with the -n option    and     Addresses in a sed script can be in any of the following forms       number       Specifying a line number will match only that line in the input       An address range can be specified by specifying two addresses   separated by a comma      An address range matches lines starting from   where the first address matches  and continues until the second   address matches  inclusively

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p   lt  dump sql

User · Answer

I wanted to do the same thing from a script using a variable and achieved it by putting quotes around the  variable to separate the variable name from the p   sed -n   first    count p imagelist txt  gt   imageblock    I wanted to split a list into separate folders and found the initial question and answer a useful step   split command not an option on the old os I have to port code to

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p 16483q  filename  gt  newfile   From the sed manual      p -        Print out the pattern space  to the standard output   This command is usually only used in conjunction with the -n command-line option       n -       If auto-print is not disabled  print the pattern space  then  regardless  replace the pattern space with the next line of input  If   there is no more input then sed exits without processing any more   commands       q -   Exit sed without processing any more commands or input    Note that the current pattern space is printed if auto-print is not disabled with the -n option    and     Addresses in a sed script can be in any of the following forms       number       Specifying a line number will match only that line in the input       An address range can be specified by specifying two addresses   separated by a comma      An address range matches lines starting from   where the first address matches  and continues until the second   address matches  inclusively

User · Answer

There is another approach with awk   awk  NR  16224  NR  16482  file   If the file is huge  it can be good to exit after reading the last desired line  This way  it won t read the following lines unnecessarily   awk  NR  16224  NR  16482-1  NR  16482  print  exit   file  awk  NR  16224  NR  16482  NR  16482  exit   file

User · Answer

Just benchmarking 3 solutions given above  that works to me   awk sed  quot head tail quot   Credits on the 3 solutions goes to    boxxar  avandeursen  wds  manveru  sibaz  SOFe  fedorqui  SO stop harming   Robin A  Meade   I m using a huge file I find in my server    wc fo2debug 1 log    10421186    19448208 38795491134 fo2debug 1 log  38 Gb in 10 4 million lines  And yes  I have a logrotate problem        Make your bets   Getting 256 lines from the beginning of the file    time sed -n  1001 1256p 1256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 003s user    0m0 000s sys     0m0 004s    time head -1256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  1001   wc -l 256  real    0m0 003s user    0m0 006s sys     0m0 000s    time awk  NR  1001  NR  1256  NR  1256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 002s user    0m0 004s sys     0m0 000s  Awk won  Technical tie in second place between sed and  quot head tail quot    Getting 256 lines at the end of the first third of the file    time sed -n  3473001 3473256p 3473256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 265s user    0m0 242s sys     0m0 024s    time head -3473256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  3473001   wc -l 256  real    0m0 308s user    0m0 313s sys     0m0 145s    time awk  NR  3473001  NR  3473256  NR  3473256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 393s user    0m0 326s sys     0m0 068s  Sed won  Followed by  quot head tail quot  and  finally  awk   Getting 256 lines at the end of the second third of the file    time sed -n  6947001 6947256p 6947256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l A256  real    0m0 525s user    0m0 462s sys     0m0 064s    time head -6947256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  6947001   wc -l 256  real    0m0 615s user    0m0 488s sys     0m0 423s    time awk  NR  6947001  NR  6947256  NR  6947256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 779s user    0m0 650s sys     0m0 130s  Same results  Sed won  Followed by  quot head tail quot  and  finally  awk   Getting 256 lines near the end of the file    time sed -n  10420001 10420256p 10420256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    1m50 017s user    0m12 735s sys     0m22 926s    time head -10420256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  10420001   wc -l 256  real    1m48 269s user    0m42 404s sys     0m51 015s    time awk  NR  10420001  NR  10420256  NR  10420256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    1m49 106s user    0m12 322s sys     0m18 576s  And suddenly  a twist   quot Head tail quot  won  Followed by awk and  finally  sed    some hours later     Sorry guys  My analysis above ends up being an example of a basic flaw in doing an analysis  The flaw is not knowing in depth the resources used for the analysis  In this case  I used a log file to analyze the performance of a search for a certain number of lines within it  Using 3 different techniques  searches were made at different points in the file  comparing the performance of the techniques at each point and checking whether the results varied depending on the point in the file where the search was made  My mistake was to assume that there was a certain homogeneity of content in the log file  The reality is that long lines appear more frequently at the end of the file  Thus  the apparent conclusion that longer searches  closer to the end of the file  are better with a given technique  may be biased  In fact  this technique may be better when dealing with longer lines  What remains to be confirmed

User · Answer

Quick and dirty   head -16428  lt  file in   tail -259  gt  file out   Probably not the best way to do it but it should work   BTW  259   16482-16224 1

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p   lt  dump sql

User · Answer

Standing on the shoulders of boxxar  I like this   sed -n   lt first line gt   p  lt last line gt q  input   e g   sed -n  16224  p 16482q  input   The   means  last line   so the first command makes sed print all lines starting with line 16224 and the second command makes sed quit after printing line 16428   Adding 1 for the q-range in boxxar s solution does not seem to be necessary    I like this variant because I don t need to specify the ending line number twice  And I measured that using   does not have detrimental effects on performance

User · Answer

Using ruby   ruby -ne  puts                if     gt   32613500  amp  amp      lt   32614500   lt  GND rdf  gt  GND extract rdf

User · Answer

The -n in the accept answers work  Here s another way in case you re inclined   cat  filename   sed    linenum p d     This does the following    pipe in the contents of a file  or feed in the text however you want   sed selects the given line  prints it d is required to delete lines  otherwise sed will assume all lines will eventually be printed  i e   without the d  you will get all lines printed by the selected line printed twice because you have the   linenum p part asking for it to be printed  I m pretty sure the -n is basically doing the same thing as the d here

User · Answer

perl -ne  print if 16224  16482  file txt  gt  new file txt

User · Answer

I wanted to do the same thing from a script using a variable and achieved it by putting quotes around the  variable to separate the variable name from the p   sed -n   first    count p imagelist txt  gt   imageblock    I wanted to split a list into separate folders and found the initial question and answer a useful step   split command not an option on the old os I have to port code to

User · Answer

There is another approach with awk   awk  NR  16224  NR  16482  file   If the file is huge  it can be good to exit after reading the last desired line  This way  it won t read the following lines unnecessarily   awk  NR  16224  NR  16482-1  NR  16482  print  exit   file  awk  NR  16224  NR  16482  NR  16482  exit   file

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p 16483q  filename  gt  newfile   From the sed manual      p -        Print out the pattern space  to the standard output   This command is usually only used in conjunction with the -n command-line option       n -       If auto-print is not disabled  print the pattern space  then  regardless  replace the pattern space with the next line of input  If   there is no more input then sed exits without processing any more   commands       q -   Exit sed without processing any more commands or input    Note that the current pattern space is printed if auto-print is not disabled with the -n option    and     Addresses in a sed script can be in any of the following forms       number       Specifying a line number will match only that line in the input       An address range can be specified by specifying two addresses   separated by a comma      An address range matches lines starting from   where the first address matches  and continues until the second   address matches  inclusively

User · Answer

I was about to post the head tail trick  but actually I d probably just fire up emacs   -    esc-x goto-line ret 16224 mark  ctrl-space  esc-x goto-line ret 16482 esc-w   open the new output file  ctl-y save  Let s me see what s happening

User · Answer

Using ed   ed -s infile  lt  lt  lt  16224 16482p    -s suppresses diagnostic output  the actual commands are in a here-string  Specifically  16224 16482p runs the p  print  command on the desired line address range

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p 16483q  filename  gt  newfile   From the sed manual      p -        Print out the pattern space  to the standard output   This command is usually only used in conjunction with the -n command-line option       n -       If auto-print is not disabled  print the pattern space  then  regardless  replace the pattern space with the next line of input  If   there is no more input then sed exits without processing any more   commands       q -   Exit sed without processing any more commands or input    Note that the current pattern space is printed if auto-print is not disabled with the -n option    and     Addresses in a sed script can be in any of the following forms       number       Specifying a line number will match only that line in the input       An address range can be specified by specifying two addresses   separated by a comma      An address range matches lines starting from   where the first address matches  and continues until the second   address matches  inclusively

User · Answer

Quite simple using head tail  head -16482 in sql   tail -258  gt  out sql  using sed  sed -n  16224 16482p  in sql  gt  out sql  using awk  awk  NR gt  16224 amp  amp NR lt  16482  in sql  gt  out sql

User · Answer

print section of file based on line numbers  sed -n  16224  16482p                  method 1  sed  16224 16482 d                    method 2

User · Answer

perl -ne  print if 16224  16482  file txt  gt  new file txt

User · Answer

This might work for you  GNU sed    sed -ne  16224 16482w newfile  -e  16482q  file   or taking advantage of bash   sed -n   16224 16482w newfile n16482q  file

User · Answer

cat dump txt   head -16224   tail -258   should do the trick  The downside of this approach is that you need to do the arithmetic to determine the argument for tail and to account for whether you want the  between  to include the ending line or not

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p   lt  dump sql

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482 p  orig-data-file  gt  new-file   Where 16224 16482 are the start line number and end line number  inclusive   This is 1-indexed   -n suppresses echoing the input as output  which you clearly don t want  the numbers indicate the range of lines to make the following command operate on  the command p prints out the relevant lines

User · Answer

I would use   awk  FNR  gt   16224  amp  amp  FNR  lt   16482  my file  gt  extracted txt   FNR contains the record  line  number of the line being read from the file

User · Answer

I would use   awk  FNR  gt   16224  amp  amp  FNR  lt   16482  my file  gt  extracted txt   FNR contains the record  line  number of the line being read from the file

User · Answer

cat dump txt   head -16224   tail -258   should do the trick  The downside of this approach is that you need to do the arithmetic to determine the argument for tail and to account for whether you want the  between  to include the ending line or not

User · Answer

Quick and dirty   head -16428  lt  file in   tail -259  gt  file out   Probably not the best way to do it but it should work   BTW  259   16482-16224 1

User · Answer

You could use  vi  and then the following command    16224 16482w  tmp some-file   Alternatively    cat file   head -n 16482   tail -n 258   EDIT - Just to add explanation  you use head -n 16482 to display first 16482 lines then use tail -n 258 to get last 258 lines out of the first output

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p   lt  dump sql

User · Answer

Using ruby   ruby -ne  puts                if     gt   32613500  amp  amp      lt   32614500   lt  GND rdf  gt  GND extract rdf

User · Answer

I wanted to do the same thing from a script using a variable and achieved it by putting quotes around the  variable to separate the variable name from the p   sed -n   first    count p imagelist txt  gt   imageblock    I wanted to split a list into separate folders and found the initial question and answer a useful step   split command not an option on the old os I have to port code to

User · Answer

I was looking for an answer to this but I had to end up writing my own code which worked  None of the answers above were satisfactory  Consider you have very large file and have certain line numbers that you want to print out but the numbers are not in order  You can do the following  My relatively large file for letter in  a  k    do echo  letter  done   cat -n  gt  myfile txt  1  a  2  b  3  c  4  d  5  e  6  f  7  g  8  h  9  i 10  j 11  k  Specific line numbers I want  shuf -i 1-11 -n 4  gt  line numbers I want txt  10  11  4  9  To print these line numbers  do the following  awk   system  quot head myfile txt -n  quot   0  quot    tail -n 1 quot     line numbers I want txt What the above does is to head the n line then take the last line using tail If you want your line numbers in order  sort   is -n numeric sort  first then get the lines  cat line numbers I want txt   sort -n   awk   system  quot head myfile txt -n  quot   0  quot    tail -n 1 quot      4  d  9  i 10  j 11  k

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p 16483q  filename  gt  newfile   From the sed manual      p -        Print out the pattern space  to the standard output   This command is usually only used in conjunction with the -n command-line option       n -       If auto-print is not disabled  print the pattern space  then  regardless  replace the pattern space with the next line of input  If   there is no more input then sed exits without processing any more   commands       q -   Exit sed without processing any more commands or input    Note that the current pattern space is printed if auto-print is not disabled with the -n option    and     Addresses in a sed script can be in any of the following forms       number       Specifying a line number will match only that line in the input       An address range can be specified by specifying two addresses   separated by a comma      An address range matches lines starting from   where the first address matches  and continues until the second   address matches  inclusively

User · Answer

Quite simple using head tail  head -16482 in sql   tail -258  gt  out sql  using sed  sed -n  16224 16482p  in sql  gt  out sql  using awk  awk  NR gt  16224 amp  amp NR lt  16482  in sql  gt  out sql

User · Answer

There is another approach with awk   awk  NR  16224  NR  16482  file   If the file is huge  it can be good to exit after reading the last desired line  This way  it won t read the following lines unnecessarily   awk  NR  16224  NR  16482-1  NR  16482  print  exit   file  awk  NR  16224  NR  16482  NR  16482  exit   file

User · Answer

I wrote a Haskell program called splitter that does exactly this  have a read through my release blog post   You can use the program as follows     cat somefile   splitter 16224-16482   And that is all that there is to it  You will need Haskell to install it  Just     cabal install splitter   And you are done  I hope that you find this program useful

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p 16483q  filename  gt  newfile   From the sed manual      p -        Print out the pattern space  to the standard output   This command is usually only used in conjunction with the -n command-line option       n -       If auto-print is not disabled  print the pattern space  then  regardless  replace the pattern space with the next line of input  If   there is no more input then sed exits without processing any more   commands       q -   Exit sed without processing any more commands or input    Note that the current pattern space is printed if auto-print is not disabled with the -n option    and     Addresses in a sed script can be in any of the following forms       number       Specifying a line number will match only that line in the input       An address range can be specified by specifying two addresses   separated by a comma      An address range matches lines starting from   where the first address matches  and continues until the second   address matches  inclusively

User · Answer

I wanted to do the same thing from a script using a variable and achieved it by putting quotes around the  variable to separate the variable name from the p   sed -n   first    count p imagelist txt  gt   imageblock    I wanted to split a list into separate folders and found the initial question and answer a useful step   split command not an option on the old os I have to port code to

User · Answer

The -n in the accept answers work  Here s another way in case you re inclined   cat  filename   sed    linenum p d     This does the following    pipe in the contents of a file  or feed in the text however you want   sed selects the given line  prints it d is required to delete lines  otherwise sed will assume all lines will eventually be printed  i e   without the d  you will get all lines printed by the selected line printed twice because you have the   linenum p part asking for it to be printed  I m pretty sure the -n is basically doing the same thing as the d here

User · Answer

cat dump txt   head -16224   tail -258   should do the trick  The downside of this approach is that you need to do the arithmetic to determine the argument for tail and to account for whether you want the  between  to include the ending line or not

User · Answer

You could use  vi  and then the following command    16224 16482w  tmp some-file   Alternatively    cat file   head -n 16482   tail -n 258   EDIT - Just to add explanation  you use head -n 16482 to display first 16482 lines then use tail -n 258 to get last 258 lines out of the first output

User · Answer

Quick and dirty   head -16428  lt  file in   tail -259  gt  file out   Probably not the best way to do it but it should work   BTW  259   16482-16224 1

User · Answer

I was looking for an answer to this but I had to end up writing my own code which worked  None of the answers above were satisfactory  Consider you have very large file and have certain line numbers that you want to print out but the numbers are not in order  You can do the following  My relatively large file for letter in  a  k    do echo  letter  done   cat -n  gt  myfile txt  1  a  2  b  3  c  4  d  5  e  6  f  7  g  8  h  9  i 10  j 11  k  Specific line numbers I want  shuf -i 1-11 -n 4  gt  line numbers I want txt  10  11  4  9  To print these line numbers  do the following  awk   system  quot head myfile txt -n  quot   0  quot    tail -n 1 quot     line numbers I want txt What the above does is to head the n line then take the last line using tail If you want your line numbers in order  sort   is -n numeric sort  first then get the lines  cat line numbers I want txt   sort -n   awk   system  quot head myfile txt -n  quot   0  quot    tail -n 1 quot      4  d  9  i 10  j 11  k

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p 16483q  filename  gt  newfile   From the sed manual      p -        Print out the pattern space  to the standard output   This command is usually only used in conjunction with the -n command-line option       n -       If auto-print is not disabled  print the pattern space  then  regardless  replace the pattern space with the next line of input  If   there is no more input then sed exits without processing any more   commands       q -   Exit sed without processing any more commands or input    Note that the current pattern space is printed if auto-print is not disabled with the -n option    and     Addresses in a sed script can be in any of the following forms       number       Specifying a line number will match only that line in the input       An address range can be specified by specifying two addresses   separated by a comma      An address range matches lines starting from   where the first address matches  and continues until the second   address matches  inclusively

User · Answer

Using ed   ed -s infile  lt  lt  lt  16224 16482p    -s suppresses diagnostic output  the actual commands are in a here-string  Specifically  16224 16482p runs the p  print  command on the desired line address range

User · Answer

I was looking for an answer to this but I had to end up writing my own code which worked  None of the answers above were satisfactory  Consider you have very large file and have certain line numbers that you want to print out but the numbers are not in order  You can do the following  My relatively large file for letter in  a  k    do echo  letter  done   cat -n  gt  myfile txt  1  a  2  b  3  c  4  d  5  e  6  f  7  g  8  h  9  i 10  j 11  k  Specific line numbers I want  shuf -i 1-11 -n 4  gt  line numbers I want txt  10  11  4  9  To print these line numbers  do the following  awk   system  quot head myfile txt -n  quot   0  quot    tail -n 1 quot     line numbers I want txt What the above does is to head the n line then take the last line using tail If you want your line numbers in order  sort   is -n numeric sort  first then get the lines  cat line numbers I want txt   sort -n   awk   system  quot head myfile txt -n  quot   0  quot    tail -n 1 quot      4  d  9  i 10  j 11  k

User · Answer

print section of file based on line numbers  sed -n  16224  16482p                  method 1  sed  16224 16482 d                    method 2

User · Answer

perl -ne  print if 16224  16482  file txt  gt  new file txt

User · Answer

Even we can do this to check at command line   cat filename sed  n1 n2 d   gt  abc txt   For Example   cat foo pl sed  100 200 d   gt  abc txt

User · Answer

I wrote a Haskell program called splitter that does exactly this  have a read through my release blog post   You can use the program as follows     cat somefile   splitter 16224-16482   And that is all that there is to it  You will need Haskell to install it  Just     cabal install splitter   And you are done  I hope that you find this program useful

User · Answer

Quite simple using head tail  head -16482 in sql   tail -258  gt  out sql  using sed  sed -n  16224 16482p  in sql  gt  out sql  using awk  awk  NR gt  16224 amp  amp NR lt  16482  in sql  gt  out sql

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482 p  orig-data-file  gt  new-file   Where 16224 16482 are the start line number and end line number  inclusive   This is 1-indexed   -n suppresses echoing the input as output  which you clearly don t want  the numbers indicate the range of lines to make the following command operate on  the command p prints out the relevant lines

User · Answer

cat dump txt   head -16224   tail -258   should do the trick  The downside of this approach is that you need to do the arithmetic to determine the argument for tail and to account for whether you want the  between  to include the ending line or not

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p 16483q  filename  gt  newfile   From the sed manual      p -        Print out the pattern space  to the standard output   This command is usually only used in conjunction with the -n command-line option       n -       If auto-print is not disabled  print the pattern space  then  regardless  replace the pattern space with the next line of input  If   there is no more input then sed exits without processing any more   commands       q -   Exit sed without processing any more commands or input    Note that the current pattern space is printed if auto-print is not disabled with the -n option    and     Addresses in a sed script can be in any of the following forms       number       Specifying a line number will match only that line in the input       An address range can be specified by specifying two addresses   separated by a comma      An address range matches lines starting from   where the first address matches  and continues until the second   address matches  inclusively

User · Answer

Quick and dirty   head -16428  lt  file in   tail -259  gt  file out   Probably not the best way to do it but it should work   BTW  259   16482-16224 1

User · Answer

Even we can do this to check at command line   cat filename sed  n1 n2 d   gt  abc txt   For Example   cat foo pl sed  100 200 d   gt  abc txt

User · Answer

I was about to post the head tail trick  but actually I d probably just fire up emacs   -    esc-x goto-line ret 16224 mark  ctrl-space  esc-x goto-line ret 16482 esc-w   open the new output file  ctl-y save  Let s me see what s happening

User · Answer

Quite simple using head tail  head -16482 in sql   tail -258  gt  out sql  using sed  sed -n  16224 16482p  in sql  gt  out sql  using awk  awk  NR gt  16224 amp  amp NR lt  16482  in sql  gt  out sql

User · Answer

I was about to post the head tail trick  but actually I d probably just fire up emacs   -    esc-x goto-line ret 16224 mark  ctrl-space  esc-x goto-line ret 16482 esc-w   open the new output file  ctl-y save  Let s me see what s happening

User · Answer

I was about to post the head tail trick  but actually I d probably just fire up emacs   -    esc-x goto-line ret 16224 mark  ctrl-space  esc-x goto-line ret 16482 esc-w   open the new output file  ctl-y save  Let s me see what s happening

User · Answer

The -n in the accept answers work  Here s another way in case you re inclined   cat  filename   sed    linenum p d     This does the following    pipe in the contents of a file  or feed in the text however you want   sed selects the given line  prints it d is required to delete lines  otherwise sed will assume all lines will eventually be printed  i e   without the d  you will get all lines printed by the selected line printed twice because you have the   linenum p part asking for it to be printed  I m pretty sure the -n is basically doing the same thing as the d here

User · Answer

print section of file based on line numbers  sed -n  16224  16482p                  method 1  sed  16224 16482 d                    method 2

User · Answer

Quite simple using head tail  head -16482 in sql   tail -258  gt  out sql  using sed  sed -n  16224 16482p  in sql  gt  out sql  using awk  awk  NR gt  16224 amp  amp NR lt  16482  in sql  gt  out sql

User · Answer

You could use  vi  and then the following command    16224 16482w  tmp some-file   Alternatively    cat file   head -n 16482   tail -n 258   EDIT - Just to add explanation  you use head -n 16482 to display first 16482 lines then use tail -n 258 to get last 258 lines out of the first output

User · Answer

Since we are talking about extracting lines of text from a text file  I will give an special case where you want to extract all lines that match a certain pattern     myfile content                        line1 not needed line2 also discarded  Data  first data line second data line                       sed -n   Data   p  myfile   Will print the  Data  line and the remaining   If you want the text from line1 to the pattern  you type  sed -n  1  Data p  myfile  Furthermore  if you know two pattern  better be unique in your text   both the beginning and end line of the range can be specified with matches   sed -n   BEGIN MARK   END MARK p  myfile

User · Answer

Using ruby   ruby -ne  puts                if     gt   32613500  amp  amp      lt   32614500   lt  GND rdf  gt  GND extract rdf

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482 p  orig-data-file  gt  new-file   Where 16224 16482 are the start line number and end line number  inclusive   This is 1-indexed   -n suppresses echoing the input as output  which you clearly don t want  the numbers indicate the range of lines to make the following command operate on  the command p prints out the relevant lines

User · Answer

Just benchmarking 3 solutions given above  that works to me   awk sed  quot head tail quot   Credits on the 3 solutions goes to    boxxar  avandeursen  wds  manveru  sibaz  SOFe  fedorqui  SO stop harming   Robin A  Meade   I m using a huge file I find in my server    wc fo2debug 1 log    10421186    19448208 38795491134 fo2debug 1 log  38 Gb in 10 4 million lines  And yes  I have a logrotate problem        Make your bets   Getting 256 lines from the beginning of the file    time sed -n  1001 1256p 1256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 003s user    0m0 000s sys     0m0 004s    time head -1256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  1001   wc -l 256  real    0m0 003s user    0m0 006s sys     0m0 000s    time awk  NR  1001  NR  1256  NR  1256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 002s user    0m0 004s sys     0m0 000s  Awk won  Technical tie in second place between sed and  quot head tail quot    Getting 256 lines at the end of the first third of the file    time sed -n  3473001 3473256p 3473256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 265s user    0m0 242s sys     0m0 024s    time head -3473256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  3473001   wc -l 256  real    0m0 308s user    0m0 313s sys     0m0 145s    time awk  NR  3473001  NR  3473256  NR  3473256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 393s user    0m0 326s sys     0m0 068s  Sed won  Followed by  quot head tail quot  and  finally  awk   Getting 256 lines at the end of the second third of the file    time sed -n  6947001 6947256p 6947256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l A256  real    0m0 525s user    0m0 462s sys     0m0 064s    time head -6947256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  6947001   wc -l 256  real    0m0 615s user    0m0 488s sys     0m0 423s    time awk  NR  6947001  NR  6947256  NR  6947256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 779s user    0m0 650s sys     0m0 130s  Same results  Sed won  Followed by  quot head tail quot  and  finally  awk   Getting 256 lines near the end of the file    time sed -n  10420001 10420256p 10420256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    1m50 017s user    0m12 735s sys     0m22 926s    time head -10420256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  10420001   wc -l 256  real    1m48 269s user    0m42 404s sys     0m51 015s    time awk  NR  10420001  NR  10420256  NR  10420256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    1m49 106s user    0m12 322s sys     0m18 576s  And suddenly  a twist   quot Head tail quot  won  Followed by awk and  finally  sed    some hours later     Sorry guys  My analysis above ends up being an example of a basic flaw in doing an analysis  The flaw is not knowing in depth the resources used for the analysis  In this case  I used a log file to analyze the performance of a search for a certain number of lines within it  Using 3 different techniques  searches were made at different points in the file  comparing the performance of the techniques at each point and checking whether the results varied depending on the point in the file where the search was made  My mistake was to assume that there was a certain homogeneity of content in the log file  The reality is that long lines appear more frequently at the end of the file  Thus  the apparent conclusion that longer searches  closer to the end of the file  are better with a given technique  may be biased  In fact  this technique may be better when dealing with longer lines  What remains to be confirmed

User · Answer

You could use  vi  and then the following command    16224 16482w  tmp some-file   Alternatively    cat file   head -n 16482   tail -n 258   EDIT - Just to add explanation  you use head -n 16482 to display first 16482 lines then use tail -n 258 to get last 258 lines out of the first output

User · Answer

I was about to post the head tail trick  but actually I d probably just fire up emacs   -    esc-x goto-line ret 16224 mark  ctrl-space  esc-x goto-line ret 16482 esc-w   open the new output file  ctl-y save  Let s me see what s happening

User · Answer

print section of file based on line numbers  sed -n  16224  16482p                  method 1  sed  16224 16482 d                    method 2

User · Answer

I would use   awk  FNR  gt   16224  amp  amp  FNR  lt   16482  my file  gt  extracted txt   FNR contains the record  line  number of the line being read from the file

User · Answer

I wrote a small bash script that you can run from your command line  so long as you update your PATH to include its directory  or you can place it in a directory that is already contained in the PATH    Usage    pinch filename start-line end-line     bin bash   Display line number ranges of a file to the terminal    Usage    pinch filename start-line end-line   By Evan J  Coon  FILENAME  1 START  2 END  3  ERROR   PINCH ERROR      Check that the number of arguments is 3 if      -lt 3    then     echo   ERROR Need three arguments  Filename Start-line End-line      exit 1 fi    Check that the file exists  if     -f   FILENAME     then     echo -e   ERROR File does not exist   n t FILENAME      exit 1 fi    Check that start-line is not greater than end-line if     START  -gt   END     then     echo -e   ERROR Start line is greater than End line       exit 1 fi    Check that start-line is positive  if     START  -lt 0    then     echo -e   ERROR Start line is less than 0       exit 1 fi    Check that end-line is positive  if     END  -lt 0    then     echo -e   ERROR End line is less than 0       exit 1 fi  NUMOFLINES   wc -l  lt    FILENAME      Check that end-line is not greater than the number of lines in the file  if     END  -gt   NUMOFLINES     then     echo -e   ERROR End line is greater than number of lines in file       exit 1 fi    The distance from the end of the file to end-line ENDDIFF     NUMOFLINES - END       For larger files  this will run more quickly  If the distance from the   end of the file to the end-line is less than the distance from the   start of the file to the start-line  then start pinching from the   bottom as opposed to the top  if     START  -lt   ENDDIFF     then      lt    FILENAME  head -n  END   tail -n   START else      lt    FILENAME  tail -n   START   head -n     END-START 1    fi    Success exit 0

User · Answer

I wrote a Haskell program called splitter that does exactly this  have a read through my release blog post   You can use the program as follows     cat somefile   splitter 16224-16482   And that is all that there is to it  You will need Haskell to install it  Just     cabal install splitter   And you are done  I hope that you find this program useful

User · Answer

Using ed   ed -s infile  lt  lt  lt  16224 16482p    -s suppresses diagnostic output  the actual commands are in a here-string  Specifically  16224 16482p runs the p  print  command on the desired line address range

User · Answer

Using ruby   ruby -ne  puts                if     gt   32613500  amp  amp      lt   32614500   lt  GND rdf  gt  GND extract rdf

User · Answer

Since we are talking about extracting lines of text from a text file  I will give an special case where you want to extract all lines that match a certain pattern     myfile content                        line1 not needed line2 also discarded  Data  first data line second data line                       sed -n   Data   p  myfile   Will print the  Data  line and the remaining   If you want the text from line1 to the pattern  you type  sed -n  1  Data p  myfile  Furthermore  if you know two pattern  better be unique in your text   both the beginning and end line of the range can be specified with matches   sed -n   BEGIN MARK   END MARK p  myfile

User · Answer

Quite simple using head tail  head -16482 in sql   tail -258  gt  out sql  using sed  sed -n  16224 16482p  in sql  gt  out sql  using awk  awk  NR gt  16224 amp  amp NR lt  16482  in sql  gt  out sql

User · Answer

print section of file based on line numbers  sed -n  16224  16482p                  method 1  sed  16224 16482 d                    method 2

User · Answer

cat dump txt   head -16224   tail -258   should do the trick  The downside of this approach is that you need to do the arithmetic to determine the argument for tail and to account for whether you want the  between  to include the ending line or not

User · Answer

perl -ne  print if 16224  16482  file txt  gt  new file txt

User · Answer

Using ed   ed -s infile  lt  lt  lt  16224 16482p    -s suppresses diagnostic output  the actual commands are in a here-string  Specifically  16224 16482p runs the p  print  command on the desired line address range

User · Answer

This might work for you  GNU sed    sed -ne  16224 16482w newfile  -e  16482q  file   or taking advantage of bash   sed -n   16224 16482w newfile n16482q  file

User · Answer

Since we are talking about extracting lines of text from a text file  I will give an special case where you want to extract all lines that match a certain pattern     myfile content                        line1 not needed line2 also discarded  Data  first data line second data line                       sed -n   Data   p  myfile   Will print the  Data  line and the remaining   If you want the text from line1 to the pattern  you type  sed -n  1  Data p  myfile  Furthermore  if you know two pattern  better be unique in your text   both the beginning and end line of the range can be specified with matches   sed -n   BEGIN MARK   END MARK p  myfile

User · Answer

Even we can do this to check at command line   cat filename sed  n1 n2 d   gt  abc txt   For Example   cat foo pl sed  100 200 d   gt  abc txt

User · Answer

cat dump txt   head -16224   tail -258   should do the trick  The downside of this approach is that you need to do the arithmetic to determine the argument for tail and to account for whether you want the  between  to include the ending line or not

User · Answer

You could use  vi  and then the following command    16224 16482w  tmp some-file   Alternatively    cat file   head -n 16482   tail -n 258   EDIT - Just to add explanation  you use head -n 16482 to display first 16482 lines then use tail -n 258 to get last 258 lines out of the first output

User · Answer

This might work for you  GNU sed    sed -ne  16224 16482w newfile  -e  16482q  file   or taking advantage of bash   sed -n   16224 16482w newfile n16482q  file

User · Answer

Quick and dirty   head -16428  lt  file in   tail -259  gt  file out   Probably not the best way to do it but it should work   BTW  259   16482-16224 1

User · Answer

The -n in the accept answers work  Here s another way in case you re inclined   cat  filename   sed    linenum p d     This does the following    pipe in the contents of a file  or feed in the text however you want   sed selects the given line  prints it d is required to delete lines  otherwise sed will assume all lines will eventually be printed  i e   without the d  you will get all lines printed by the selected line printed twice because you have the   linenum p part asking for it to be printed  I m pretty sure the -n is basically doing the same thing as the d here

User · Answer

Quick and dirty   head -16428  lt  file in   tail -259  gt  file out   Probably not the best way to do it but it should work   BTW  259   16482-16224 1

User · Answer

Since we are talking about extracting lines of text from a text file  I will give an special case where you want to extract all lines that match a certain pattern     myfile content                        line1 not needed line2 also discarded  Data  first data line second data line                       sed -n   Data   p  myfile   Will print the  Data  line and the remaining   If you want the text from line1 to the pattern  you type  sed -n  1  Data p  myfile  Furthermore  if you know two pattern  better be unique in your text   both the beginning and end line of the range can be specified with matches   sed -n   BEGIN MARK   END MARK p  myfile

User · Answer

sed -n  16224 16482p   lt  dump sql

User · Answer

I wrote a small bash script that you can run from your command line  so long as you update your PATH to include its directory  or you can place it in a directory that is already contained in the PATH    Usage    pinch filename start-line end-line     bin bash   Display line number ranges of a file to the terminal    Usage    pinch filename start-line end-line   By Evan J  Coon  FILENAME  1 START  2 END  3  ERROR   PINCH ERROR      Check that the number of arguments is 3 if      -lt 3    then     echo   ERROR Need three arguments  Filename Start-line End-line      exit 1 fi    Check that the file exists  if     -f   FILENAME     then     echo -e   ERROR File does not exist   n t FILENAME      exit 1 fi    Check that start-line is not greater than end-line if     START  -gt   END     then     echo -e   ERROR Start line is greater than End line       exit 1 fi    Check that start-line is positive  if     START  -lt 0    then     echo -e   ERROR Start line is less than 0       exit 1 fi    Check that end-line is positive  if     END  -lt 0    then     echo -e   ERROR End line is less than 0       exit 1 fi  NUMOFLINES   wc -l  lt    FILENAME      Check that end-line is not greater than the number of lines in the file  if     END  -gt   NUMOFLINES     then     echo -e   ERROR End line is greater than number of lines in file       exit 1 fi    The distance from the end of the file to end-line ENDDIFF     NUMOFLINES - END       For larger files  this will run more quickly  If the distance from the   end of the file to the end-line is less than the distance from the   start of the file to the start-line  then start pinching from the   bottom as opposed to the top  if     START  -lt   ENDDIFF     then      lt    FILENAME  head -n  END   tail -n   START else      lt    FILENAME  tail -n   START   head -n     END-START 1    fi    Success exit 0

User · Answer

I would use   awk  FNR  gt   16224  amp  amp  FNR  lt   16482  my file  gt  extracted txt   FNR contains the record  line  number of the line being read from the file

User · Answer

print section of file based on line numbers  sed -n  16224  16482p                  method 1  sed  16224 16482 d                    method 2

User · Answer

You could use  vi  and then the following command    16224 16482w  tmp some-file   Alternatively    cat file   head -n 16482   tail -n 258   EDIT - Just to add explanation  you use head -n 16482 to display first 16482 lines then use tail -n 258 to get last 258 lines out of the first output

User · Answer

perl -ne  print if 16224  16482  file txt  gt  new file txt

User · Answer

This might work for you  GNU sed    sed -ne  16224 16482w newfile  -e  16482q  file   or taking advantage of bash   sed -n   16224 16482w newfile n16482q  file

User · Answer

I wrote a small bash script that you can run from your command line  so long as you update your PATH to include its directory  or you can place it in a directory that is already contained in the PATH    Usage    pinch filename start-line end-line     bin bash   Display line number ranges of a file to the terminal    Usage    pinch filename start-line end-line   By Evan J  Coon  FILENAME  1 START  2 END  3  ERROR   PINCH ERROR      Check that the number of arguments is 3 if      -lt 3    then     echo   ERROR Need three arguments  Filename Start-line End-line      exit 1 fi    Check that the file exists  if     -f   FILENAME     then     echo -e   ERROR File does not exist   n t FILENAME      exit 1 fi    Check that start-line is not greater than end-line if     START  -gt   END     then     echo -e   ERROR Start line is greater than End line       exit 1 fi    Check that start-line is positive  if     START  -lt 0    then     echo -e   ERROR Start line is less than 0       exit 1 fi    Check that end-line is positive  if     END  -lt 0    then     echo -e   ERROR End line is less than 0       exit 1 fi  NUMOFLINES   wc -l  lt    FILENAME      Check that end-line is not greater than the number of lines in the file  if     END  -gt   NUMOFLINES     then     echo -e   ERROR End line is greater than number of lines in file       exit 1 fi    The distance from the end of the file to end-line ENDDIFF     NUMOFLINES - END       For larger files  this will run more quickly  If the distance from the   end of the file to the end-line is less than the distance from the   start of the file to the start-line  then start pinching from the   bottom as opposed to the top  if     START  -lt   ENDDIFF     then      lt    FILENAME  head -n  END   tail -n   START else      lt    FILENAME  tail -n   START   head -n     END-START 1    fi    Success exit 0

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Just benchmarking 3 solutions given above  that works to me   awk sed  quot head tail quot   Credits on the 3 solutions goes to    boxxar  avandeursen  wds  manveru  sibaz  SOFe  fedorqui  SO stop harming   Robin A  Meade   I m using a huge file I find in my server    wc fo2debug 1 log    10421186    19448208 38795491134 fo2debug 1 log  38 Gb in 10 4 million lines  And yes  I have a logrotate problem        Make your bets   Getting 256 lines from the beginning of the file    time sed -n  1001 1256p 1256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 003s user    0m0 000s sys     0m0 004s    time head -1256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  1001   wc -l 256  real    0m0 003s user    0m0 006s sys     0m0 000s    time awk  NR  1001  NR  1256  NR  1256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 002s user    0m0 004s sys     0m0 000s  Awk won  Technical tie in second place between sed and  quot head tail quot    Getting 256 lines at the end of the first third of the file    time sed -n  3473001 3473256p 3473256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 265s user    0m0 242s sys     0m0 024s    time head -3473256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  3473001   wc -l 256  real    0m0 308s user    0m0 313s sys     0m0 145s    time awk  NR  3473001  NR  3473256  NR  3473256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 393s user    0m0 326s sys     0m0 068s  Sed won  Followed by  quot head tail quot  and  finally  awk   Getting 256 lines at the end of the second third of the file    time sed -n  6947001 6947256p 6947256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l A256  real    0m0 525s user    0m0 462s sys     0m0 064s    time head -6947256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  6947001   wc -l 256  real    0m0 615s user    0m0 488s sys     0m0 423s    time awk  NR  6947001  NR  6947256  NR  6947256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    0m0 779s user    0m0 650s sys     0m0 130s  Same results  Sed won  Followed by  quot head tail quot  and  finally  awk   Getting 256 lines near the end of the file    time sed -n  10420001 10420256p 10420256q  fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    1m50 017s user    0m12 735s sys     0m22 926s    time head -10420256 fo2debug 1 log   tail -n  10420001   wc -l 256  real    1m48 269s user    0m42 404s sys     0m51 015s    time awk  NR  10420001  NR  10420256  NR  10420256  exit   fo2debug 1 log   wc -l 256  real    1m49 106s user    0m12 322s sys     0m18 576s  And suddenly  a twist   quot Head tail quot  won  Followed by awk and  finally  sed    some hours later     Sorry guys  My analysis above ends up being an example of a basic flaw in doing an analysis  The flaw is not knowing in depth the resources used for the analysis  In this case  I used a log file to analyze the performance of a search for a certain number of lines within it  Using 3 different techniques  searches were made at different points in the file  comparing the performance of the techniques at each point and checking whether the results varied depending on the point in the file where the search was made  My mistake was to assume that there was a certain homogeneity of content in the log file  The reality is that long lines appear more frequently at the end of the file  Thus  the apparent conclusion that longer searches  closer to the end of the file  are better with a given technique  may be biased  In fact  this technique may be better when dealing with longer lines  What remains to be confirmed

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perl -ne  print if 16224  16482  file txt  gt  new file txt

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I was about to post the head tail trick  but actually I d probably just fire up emacs   -    esc-x goto-line ret 16224 mark  ctrl-space  esc-x goto-line ret 16482 esc-w   open the new output file  ctl-y save  Let s me see what s happening

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sed -n  16224 16482p   lt  dump sql

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perl -ne  print if 16224  16482  file txt  gt  new file txt

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Quick and dirty   head -16428  lt  file in   tail -259  gt  file out   Probably not the best way to do it but it should work   BTW  259   16482-16224 1

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perl -ne  print if 16224  16482  file txt  gt  new file txt

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sed -n  16224 16482p   lt  dump sql

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sed -n  16224 16482 p  orig-data-file  gt  new-file   Where 16224 16482 are the start line number and end line number  inclusive   This is 1-indexed   -n suppresses echoing the input as output  which you clearly don t want  the numbers indicate the range of lines to make the following command operate on  the command p prints out the relevant lines

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Quick and dirty   head -16428  lt  file in   tail -259  gt  file out   Probably not the best way to do it but it should work   BTW  259   16482-16224 1

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You could use  vi  and then the following command    16224 16482w  tmp some-file   Alternatively    cat file   head -n 16482   tail -n 258   EDIT - Just to add explanation  you use head -n 16482 to display first 16482 lines then use tail -n 258 to get last 258 lines out of the first output

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sed -n  16224 16482 p  orig-data-file  gt  new-file   Where 16224 16482 are the start line number and end line number  inclusive   This is 1-indexed   -n suppresses echoing the input as output  which you clearly don t want  the numbers indicate the range of lines to make the following command operate on  the command p prints out the relevant lines

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Standing on the shoulders of boxxar  I like this   sed -n   lt first line gt   p  lt last line gt q  input   e g   sed -n  16224  p 16482q  input   The   means  last line   so the first command makes sed print all lines starting with line 16224 and the second command makes sed quit after printing line 16428   Adding 1 for the q-range in boxxar s solution does not seem to be necessary    I like this variant because I don t need to specify the ending line number twice  And I measured that using   does not have detrimental effects on performance

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There is another approach with awk   awk  NR  16224  NR  16482  file   If the file is huge  it can be good to exit after reading the last desired line  This way  it won t read the following lines unnecessarily   awk  NR  16224  NR  16482-1  NR  16482  print  exit   file  awk  NR  16224  NR  16482  NR  16482  exit   file

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sed -n  16224 16482 p  orig-data-file  gt  new-file   Where 16224 16482 are the start line number and end line number  inclusive   This is 1-indexed   -n suppresses echoing the input as output  which you clearly don t want  the numbers indicate the range of lines to make the following command operate on  the command p prints out the relevant lines

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cat dump txt   head -16224   tail -258   should do the trick  The downside of this approach is that you need to do the arithmetic to determine the argument for tail and to account for whether you want the  between  to include the ending line or not

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cat dump txt   head -16224   tail -258   should do the trick  The downside of this approach is that you need to do the arithmetic to determine the argument for tail and to account for whether you want the  between  to include the ending line or not

[unix] How can I extract a predetermined range of lines from a text file on Unix?

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