11

input.txt (around 30K lines)

RT|367079254|bn|ERTS01065811.1| 38 1 503
RT|367079251|bn|ERTS01065814.1| 56 3 502
RT|367079248|bn|ERTS01065817.1| 52 2 502

output.txt

RT|367079254|bn|ERTS01065811.1|
38
1
503
RT|367079251|bn|ERTS01065814.1|
56
3
502
RT|367079248|bn|ERTS01065817.1|
52
2
502

3 Answers 3

27

I think your easiest way to do this is with tr:

tr '\t' '\n' < input.txt > output.txt

That'll turn all the tabs to newlines.

tr - Man Page

2
  • 1
    Easiest and fastest, too.
    – JRFerguson
    Oct 2, 2012 at 22:58
  • 1
    You should have been awarded this answer, as tr was the best solution. Both sed, and awk, while great tools, are overkill. Nov 1, 2012 at 14:50
8

Sed:

sed -e 'y/\t/\n/' input.txt > output.txt

Awk:

awk 'BEGIN { OFS = "\n" } { $1=$1; print }' input.txt > output.txt
0

With printf :

printf '%s\n' $(<FILE)
2
  • I wonder why this was down-voted. Oct 2, 2012 at 22:41
  • Possibly because this will split on spaces not just tabs.
    – jordanm
    Oct 3, 2012 at 3:43

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