Question

cat test.txt
#this is comment
line 1
line 2
#this is comment at line 3
line4

script:

result=`awk '/^#.*/ { print }' test.txt `

for x in $result
do
echo x
done

expected output:

#this is comment
#this is comment at line 3

getting output:

#this
is
comment
#this
is
comment
at
line
3

but when i execute this command awk '/^#.*/ { print }' test.txt,
i get expected result.
I am putting this in loop because I need to capture each comment one at a time, not all together.

Answer 1

This happens because for x in $result will loop through each word in $result – that’s what for is meant to do.

Try this instead:

echo "$result" | while read x; do
    echo "$x"
done

read will take one line at a time, which is what you need here.