Check field length using awk

Question

I have a file of 3 fields:

123710337783,351898014413150,123028040249634 123710337785,352934028758390,123028040109275 

I need to check that the fields meet the following lengths:

Field 1 = 12 Field 2 = 15 or 16 Field 3 = 15 

I get an error when running this:

awk -F, '{if(length($2) == 15 ) || length($2) == 16) && length($1) == 12 && length($3)) == 15) print  }' 

Please assist.

Bernie

Answer 1

All your brackets are mismatched. An 'if' expression must be contained within brackets, i.e.,

if (X == 45) ... if ((X == 45) || (Y == 23)) ... 

you don't have this, and you've got more closing brackets than opening brackets - so the balance is off as well; if we count the brackets (increment for open, decrement for close), we end up with a total of -3 instead of 0, so closing three more brackets than we have open:

            1      2  1       0          1  0     -1          0 -1                0 -1 -2     -3 awk -F, '{if(length($2) == 15 ) || length($2) == 16) && length($1) == 12 && length($3)  ) == 15) print  }' 

So, try this instead which rebalances everything:

awk -F, '{ if (((length($2) == 15 ) || length($2) == 16) && (length($1) == 12 && length($3) == 15)) print }' 

Answer 2

If all you're going to do is print, then put your expression as the default condition:

awk -F, 'length($1)==12 && (length($2)==15 || length($2)==16) && length($3)==15' 

If you're trying to filter out lines in your input file that don't meet this criteria:

awk -F, '     length($1)!=12 || length($2)<15 || length($2)>16 || length($3)!=15) {next}     # do other stuff... '