Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!ames!uhccux!munnari.oz.au!cs.mu.oz.au!ok
From: ok@cs.mu.oz.au (Richard O'Keefe)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: file too large
Summary: use split(1)
Keywords: vi can't read file - help?
Message-ID: <2121@munnari.oz.au>
Date: 17 Sep 89 10:51:44 GMT
References: <2388@netcom.UUCP>
Sender: news@cs.mu.oz.au
Lines: 28

In article <2388@netcom.UUCP>, beaulieu@netcom.UUCP (Bob Beaulieu) writes:
> I have a text file that is very large (26,000+ lines) and would like
> to break it down to 5-6 smaller files.

If you have split, it may do what you want:
	split -5000 foobaz
where foobaz contains 26,123 lines, will create
	xaa	# lines      1- 5,000
	xab	# lines  5,001-10,000
	xac	# lines 10,001-15,000
	xad	# lines 15,001-20,000
	xae	# lines 20,001-25,000
	xaf	# lines 25,001-26,123
If you want 'zabbo' used as the prefix instead of 'x', say
	split -5000 foobaz zabbo
and you'll get zabbo{aa,ab,ac,ad,ae,af} produced instead.
If you haven't got split, I can mail a version which is rather sexier.

Of course you could always do this with 'awk', use
	awk -f split-5000-by-6.awk foobaz
where the file split-5000-by-6.awk contains these lines:
	    1 <= NR && NR <=  5000 { print $0 > "xaa" }
	 5001 <= NR && NR <= 10000 { print $0 > "xab" }
	10001 <= NR && NR <= 15000 { print $0 > "xac" }
	15001 <= NR && NR <= 20000 { print $0 > "xad" }
	20001 <= NR && NR <= 25000 { print $0 > "xae" }
	25001 <= NR && NR <= 30000 { print $0 > "xaf" }
There Is Always Another Way...