awk exiting the ACTION path and going directly to END part

Question

I am using an awk script and the skeleton of the same is simple

 awk '
 BEGIN {
     Variable declaration
 }
 {
    ACTION PART
 }
 END
 {
 }' FILE A

The file A is such a huge file. So I wanted not to traverse the entire file and so what I am trying to do is, I am trying to keep some checks in ACTION PART in such a way that if that check is successful, then I need to skip reading the rest part of the file and directly go to END part.

My question is how would I redirect the script from ACTION PART to END Part based on the condition.. I am looking for some kind of command like "break" in for loop. Could you people share your ideas. Thank you.

Answer 1

The exit command will do what you want.

From the man page:

Similarly, all the END blocks are merged, and executed when all the input is exhausted (or when an exit statement is executed).