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up vote 2 down vote favorite

I have a file like below.. 

abc, 12345

def, text and nos

ghi, something else

jkl, words and numbers


abc, 56345

def, text and nos

ghi, something else

jkl, words and numbers


abc, 15475

def, text and nos

ghi, something else

jkl, words and numbers


abc, 123345

def, text and nos

ghi, something else

jkl, words and numbers

I want to convert it as: 

abc, 12345, 56345, 15475, 123345

def, text and nos, text and nos,text and nos,text and nos

ghi, something else, something else, something else, something else

jkl, words and numbers, words and numbers, words and numbers, words and numbers,

Any help ?

share|improve this question
    
Do you actually have the extra blank lines in your input file? If not, please edit and remove them, you should show the file exactly as it is. –  terdon♦ Apr 11 at 14:23

2 Answers 2

up vote 4 down vote

If you don't mind the order of output:

$ awk -F',' 'NF>1{a[$1] = a[$1]","$2}END{for(i in a){print i""a[i]}}' file 
jkl, words and numbers, words and numbers, words and numbers, words and numbers
abc, 12345, 56345, 15475, 123345
ghi, something else, something else, something else, something else
def, text and nos, text and nos, text and nos, text and nos

Explanation

  • NF>1 meaning we only need to process for line which is not blank.
  • We save all first field in the associative array a, with the key is the first field, the value is second field (or the rest of the line). If the key has already haved value, we concat two values.
  • In END block, we loop through the associative array a, print all its keys with corresponding value.

Or using perl will keep the order:

$perl -F',' -anle 'next if /^$/;$h{$F[0]} = $h{$F[0]}.", ".$F[1];
    END{print $_,$h{$_},"\n" for sort keys %h}' file
abc, 12345, 56345, 15475, 123345

def, text and nos, text and nos, text and nos, text and nos

ghi, something else, something else, something else, something else

jkl, words and numbers, words and numbers, words and numbers, words and numbers
share|improve this answer
    
your perl solution from my question unix.stackexchange.com/questions/124181/… should also work right? –  Ramesh Apr 11 at 4:08
    
No. The OP want to concat string based on column 1, regardless of duplicated or not. Your question doesn't want duplicated. –  Gnouc Apr 11 at 4:16
    
oh ok. At the first glance, it seemed like almost similar to my question. :) –  Ramesh Apr 11 at 4:19
1  
Neat, +1! That doesn't keep the order though, it only recreates it in this particular example where the fields are in alphabetical order. –  terdon♦ Apr 11 at 14:29
    
Just for laughs, I'd written almost exactly the same approach before reading your answer: perl -F, -lane 'next unless /./;push @{$k{$F[0]}}, ",@F[1..$#F]"; END{print "$_@{$k{$_}}" foreach keys(%k)}' file :) Great minds think alike! –  terdon♦ Apr 11 at 14:43
up vote 1 down vote

Oh, that's an easy one. Here's a simple version that keeps the order of the keys as they appear in the file:

$ awk -F, '
    /.+/{
        if (!($1 in Val)) { Key[++i] = $1; }
        Val[$1] = Val[$1] "," $2; 
    }
    END{
        for (j = 1; j <= i; j++) {
            printf("%s %s\n%s", Key[j], Val[Key[j]], (j == i) ? "" : "\n");       
        }                                    
    }' file.txt

Output should look like this: 

abc, 12345, 56345, 15475, 123345

def, text and nos, text and nos, text and nos, text and nos

ghi, something else, something else, something else, something else

jkl, words and numbers, words and numbers, words and numbers, words and numbers

If you don't mind having an extra blank line at the end, just replace the printf line with printf("%s %s\n\n", Key[j], Val[Key[j]]);

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