Question

I know the Linux command paste can be used to combine two lines in two files. My question is how can I add some other string inside them?

For example, I have 2 files:

[root@localhost ~]# cat c1
aaaa
bbbbbbbbbbbbb
[root@localhost ~]# cat c2
11111111
222222222222
[root@localhost ~]# 
[root@localhost ~]# paste c1 c2
aaaa    11111111
bbbbbbbbbbbbb   222222222222
[root@localhost ~]# 

How can I insert text between them, for example, how can I get the following result?

var aaaa = some_function(11111111);
var bbbbbbbbbbbbb = some_function(222222222222);

Can this be implemented by the paste command? Thanks.

Answer 1

Maybe there’s a way to do this with paste, but it can certainly be done easily with awk:

paste c1 c2 | awk '{ printf("var %s = some_function(%s);\n", $1, $2); }'