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From: phd_ivo@gsbacd.uchicago.edu
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: sort with a tab as separator
Message-ID: <1990Aug19.051237.27735@midway.uchicago.edu>
Date: 19 Aug 90 04:09:28 GMT
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Organization: University of Chicago Graduate School of Business
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In article <13617@smoke.BRL.MIL>, gwyn@smoke.BRL.MIL (Doug Gwyn) writes...
 
+So get a real shell:
+	$ echo '   ' | od -c
+	0000000  \t  \n

On a NeXT improved csh (and presumably on some other shells), the following
works:

	sort -t\^V^I

that is, the tab must be quoted twice: once with the backslash, and then with
the ^V (control-V) to not substitute spaces.

Once you know this, it is no big deal, of course.

/ivo welch	ivo@next.agsm.ucla.edu