Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!purdue!decwrl!ucbvax!hplabs!hp-pcd!hpcvca!scott
From: scott@hpcvca.CV.HP.COM (Scott Linn)
Newsgroups: comp.sys.ibm.pc
Subject: Re: Now that the smoke had cleared (Honest Mac/IBM questions)
Message-ID: <5640017@hpcvca.CV.HP.COM>
Date: 5 Jan 90 20:40:21 GMT
References: <1284@marlin.NOSC.MIL>
Organization: Hewlett-Packard Co., Corvallis, Oregon
Lines: 22

/ hpcvca:comp.sys.ibm.pc / rob@disk.UUCP (Rob Miracle) /  9:59 am  Dec 31, 1989 /
>In article <30290@shemp.CS.UCLA.EDU>, srt@maui.cs.ucla.edu (Scott Turner) writes:
>> Differing computing paradigms but the same task paradigm.  Rephrase
>> the question slightly: How do I take the output from my test program,
>> pull out the column of numbers I'm interested in, sort it, and print
>> it on my LW?  Not terribly difficult in the PC/Unix world - you just
>> string together some tools "test | awk | sort | print" or whatever.
>> Nearly impossible on the Mac.

>Not so, not so.  In the Mac, you run the test program, take the mouse and
>cut the column out, quit the test program and load it into a utility that can
>sort and print (Column of numbers and Excel are a likely pair) and paste the
>column back in.

Yeah, if the column of numbers line up, they are contiguous, etc.  The beauty
of awk, etc. is that they can grab numbers out of a column of numbers, and
then *selectively* use it.  Also, the column doesn't have to physically "line
up" from top to bottom.  There is a big difference between using awk and
cutting a column of numbers out of a file.  And, there are a lot of programs
which will cut columns out on the PC, too.

Scott Linn