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From: brnstnd@stealth.acf.nyu.edu
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions,comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: AWK/shell quoting
Message-ID: <4614@stealth.acf.nyu.edu>
Date: 7 Jan 90 22:34:25 GMT
References: <487@longway.TIC.COM> <166@omaha1.UUCP> <18067@umn-cs.CS.UMN.EDU> <1990Jan6.233340.9978@smsc.sony.com> <2367@leah.Albany.Edu> <6954@lindy.Stanford.EDU>
Reply-To: brnstnd@stealth.acf.nyu.edu (Dan Bernstein)
Distribution: usa
Organization: IR
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In article <6954@lindy.Stanford.EDU> karish@forel.stanford.edu (Chuck Karish) writes:
>     awk 'BEGIN {print "'"'"'"}'
>                       1234321

That numbering may confuse some readers. How about this:

      awk 'BEGIN {print "'"'"'"}'
	  1--------------1   2--2
			  3-3
			4  -  4
			   5

The shell leaves single-quoted text (1-1,2-2) alone. It does a bit of
interpretation (none in this case) on the double-quoted text (3-3).
Awk sees a double-quoted string (4-4) and prints it. The string, of
course, is the completely uninterpreted single quote (5).

I would replace the "'" (3-3) by \', which is a few microseconds faster
and might save a bit of disk space and typing time. :-)

---Dan