Question

I’ve got two properties files and I’d like to replace key/value pairs in File A with any matching key/value entries in File B. File A will have more entries than File B – it’s not expected that the two files will have the exact same number of entries. Also, File B might have entries which are not included in File A.

As an example:

File A
"GB" = "United Kingdom";
"SE" = "Sweden";
"BR" = "Brazil";
"FR" = "France";
"ES" = "Spain";
"DE" = "Germany";

File B
"GB" = "Regno Unito";
"SE" = "Svezia";
"BR" = "Brasile";
"BR" = "Brasile";
"CL" = "Cile";

Desired Result
"GB" = "Regno Unito";
"SE" = "Svezia";
"BR" = "Brasile";
"FR" = "France";
"ES" = "Spain";
"DE" = "Germany";
"CL" = "Cile";

Is it possible to execute this search and replace using bash?

Thanks,

Sean

Answer 1

Here’s one way using GNU awk:

awk -F " = " 'FNR==NR { array[$1]=$2; next } $1 in array { sub ($2, array[$1]) }1' fileb filea

Results:

"GB" = "Regno Unito";
"SE" = "Svezia";
"BR" = "Brasile";
"FR" = "France";
"ES" = "Spain";
"DE" = "Germany";

---

EDIT:

You can simply delete the array elements after a substitution has occurred. Then at the end of the script, print out what’s left:

awk -F " = " 'FNR==NR { array[$1]=$2; next } $1 in array { sub ($2, array[$1]); delete array[$1] }1; END { for (i in array) print i FS array[i] }' fileb filea

Results:

"GB" = "Regno Unito";
"SE" = "Svezia";
"BR" = "Brasile";
"FR" = "France";
"ES" = "Spain";
"DE" = "Germany";
"CL" = "Cile";