Get N'th line of multiple files in linux

Question

The task I'm trying to accomplish is, I have this kind of files:

test1.csv test2.csv test3.csv etc...

And I want to get 3'rd line of every file. Right now, I can get 3'rd lines using awk, or sed like

echo | awk 'FNR == 3 { print; exit }' test1.csv >> last_file.csv or using sed or tail.

But when I try to do this on multiple files, It cannot get the lines. I want to do like this,

echo | awk 'FNR == 3 { print; exit }' test*.csv >> last_file.csv

How can I achieve this?

Thank you.

Answer 1

Get rid of the useless echo, the incorrect exit and the redundant print:

awk 'FNR == 3' test*.csv

Answer 2

You should use

awk 'FNR == 3 { print; nextfile }' test*.csv >> last_file.csv

The problem is that when you use exit, it stops awk from processing input completely. The nextfile tells awk to stop processing the current file and go to the next file. The echo command as you are using it is not necessary.

Read more here:

http://www.gnu.org/software/gawk/manual/html_node/Nextfile-Statement.html