Unix script to remove the first line of a CSV file

Question

I've stated before I'm not very good at scripting so what I have below copies files from a share directory to mine where I change their permissions. But then I wanted to remove the first line in each of the CSV files — the headings — and then I wanted to get this to run every hour.

cd /users
scp dehpc14_Disk_Quota_Report.csv /h/u544835
scp dehpc14_User_Disk_Usage.csv /h/u544835
cd /h/u544835
chmod 755 dehpc14_Disk_Quota_Report.csv
chmod 755 dehpc14_User_Disk_Usage.csv

* insert delete csv first line here *

Can anyone help me with deleting the first line of the CSV file and getting this to run automatically every hour, for example, or direct me to something I might understand to get cracking with it?

Answer 1

You can delete the first line of a file using sed:

sed -i '' 1d file.csv

If you just want to get the contents of the file without the first line, and without modifying the file, remove the -i '' flag:

sed 1d file.csv

Here 1d is the command to execute:

• 1 => line where to act
• d => delete

So 1d means 'delete line 1'

If you want to get the first line, you can use sed too:

sed -n 1p file.csv

Here p stands for 'print' or

sed 1q file.csv

(see William Pursell's comment)

Answer 2

I tried to delete the first row from a CSV, cd into the location and then the answer to the question didn't work for me, was getting

sed: can't read 1d: No such file or directory

So, I've used the following stated here by @amit

sed -i '1d' filename.csv

Answer 3

To create a new CSV file without the header, you can do the following:

sed 1d file_with_header.csv > file_without_header.csv