Question

i have this data :

Values  
10  
20  
30  
40  
50  
12  
15  
18

I want to have the max of the column, skipping the first line so i tried :

awk 'NR>1 || a<$1{a=$1}  END{print a}' file.txt

But it returns 18 when I expected 50. Where is my mistake ?

P.S :

awk ' a<$1{a=$1}  END{print a}' file.txt

It returns Values which is not good either

Answer 1

Get the minimum values from a single column file with a header:

awk 'NR > 1 && min=="" || min > $1 { min = $1 } END { print min }' file.txt

Get the maximum values from a single column file with a header:

awk 'NR > 1 && max < $1 { max = $1 } END { print max }' file.txt