Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!rosevax!scooter!dan
From: dan@scooter.rosemount.com (Dan Messinger)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: Need script to pluck lines of text from a file
Keywords: AWK,script,lines,need advice
Message-ID: <8957@rosevax.Rosemount.COM>
Date: 3 Jul 90 17:01:20 GMT
References: <1990Jun30.180958.28569@cbnewsd.att.com>
Sender: jaychri@rosevax.Rosemount.COM
Reply-To: dan@scooter.rosemount.com (Dan Messinger)
Organization: Rosemount Industrial
Lines: 36

In article <1990Jun30.180958.28569@cbnewsd.att.com>,
jfb200@cbnewsd.att.com (joseph.f.baugher) writes:
|> 
|> I am looking for a Shell script capable of doing the following job:
|> 
|> I have a file consisting of several dozen lines of text, as per example:
|> 
|> 		text in line 1
|> 		text in line 2
|> 		....
|> 		text in line n
|> 		startmarker
|> 		text in line n+1
|> 		text in line n+2
|> 		....
|> 	        ...
|> 		text in line n+m-1
|> 		endmarker
|> 		text in line n+m+1
|> 		text in line n+m+2
|> 		....
|> 	        ....
|> where startmarker and endmarker are lines of text with characteristic
|> markers in them which identify them as unique and different from the others.
|> I want to be able to pipe the lines of text BETWEEN startmarker and
|> endmarker to another command for further processing.  Unfortunately,
I do not
|> know ahead of time what the numbers n and m are.
|> 

Sounds like a job for sed.

sed -n "/^startmarker/,/^endmarker/p"

Dan Messinger
dan@scooter.rosemount.com