--- Brad <brad@bradandkim.net> wrote:

...

How about: home:~$join file1 file2 > file2a home:~$join file2a file3 > file3a

syntax : join [options] <file1 name> <file2 name>

Or at least that used to be the syntax. It may have changed. 'Man join' or 'info coreutils join' should get you there. also you can specify which field is the match field for each file with options -1 and -2. Also, the files have to be sorted on the key field.

I know this may not be as exciting as writing an awk or shell script, but it should get the job done. And if you need to remove any columns from the final file "cut" should do the job.

So if you need to sort the files then match them and then cut fields out:

!/bin/bash # my file merger script sort -k12.14 vpifile > file1 sort -k1.14 ipfile > file2

Oops! That should read: sort -k=12.14 vpifile > file1 sort -k=1.14 ipfile > file2 etc. Computers are soooooooo picky about typos. ;') Kind of like KCLUG that way, but fortunately I caught it before being slammed by the syntax nazis. ;')

This looks like just what I need. I will research this more...thanks.

Good. Let me know if it works. Brian D. __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? Make Yahoo! your home page http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs