The following assumes a newline at the end of each paragraph. The PERL script below will put a blank line after each unwrapped paragraph, which in text is just one long line terminated with a newline. Put the perl script in your ~/bin/ directory in a file named doublespace and chmod it to 755. Next, the following command will break an unwrapped paragraph into 75 character lines: fold -sbw 75 <file> Now put the two together: cat $1 | doublespace | fold -sbw 75 Put the above command into ~/bin/dscat, chmod it to 755 and you can do: dscat unwrapped_file > double_spaced_file Now here's the perl script: #!/usr/local/bin/perl # Double space the standard input. Expects a text file. while(<STDIN>) { chomp $_; if ($_ eq "" or $_ =~ /^ *$/) { print "\n"; } else { print "$_ "; } } On Fri, Mar 27, 2020 at 02:27:02PM -0500, Linux for blind general discussion wrote: > On March 27, 2020, Linux for blind general discussion wrote: > > does anyone know a way to automate inserting blank lines before > > and after each line in a file that's too long to fit on the screen > > all at once and then hard wrap those long lines? > > Well, since adding a blank line after each line-break puts a blank > line before the next line, you (should?) only need to add newlines > after each line which can easily be done with sed: > > $ sed G input_file.txt > output_file_with_spaces.txt > > If you want to format the lines at the same time, you can do that > with "fmt" > > $ sed G input.txt | fmt > formatted_output_with_spaces.txt > > By default, fmt formats to 72 characters wide but you can adjust that > using > > fmt -80 > > Hope this helps, > > -tim > > > > _______________________________________________ > Blinux-list mailing list > Blinux-list@xxxxxxxxxx > https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/blinux-list -- Rudy Vener Website: http://www.rudyvener.com _______________________________________________ Blinux-list mailing list Blinux-list@xxxxxxxxxx https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/blinux-list