Thanks to everyone who posted. I never thought to use the ``. It's just like perl and php.. Can run another program as the input. This solved my problem. As far as the tr command being used: why did it return different results each time? I haven't seen that happen during the times I've run it. Here is what I get: [root@ntlh spam]# grep 'info3@' * | cut -f 1 -d : | tr \\012 \\40 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIME1pW024484 hBIME1pW024484 hBIME1pW024484 hBIMZFpW025094 hBIMZFpW025094 hBIMZFpW025094 hBINOYpW026189 hBINOYpW026189 hBINOYpW026189 [root@ntlh spam]# grep 'info3@' * | cut -f 1 -d : | tr \\012 \\40 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIME1pW024484 hBIME1pW024484 hBIME1pW024484 hBIMZFpW025094 hBIMZFpW025094 hBIMZFpW025094 hBINOYpW026189 hBINOYpW026189 hBINOYpW026189 [root@ntlh spam]# grep 'info3@' * | cut -f 1 -d : | tr \\012 \\40 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIME1pW024484 hBIME1pW024484 hBIME1pW024484 hBIMZFpW025094 hBIMZFpW025094 hBIMZFpW025094 hBINOYpW026189 hBINOYpW026189 hBINOYpW026189 [root@ntlh spam]# grep 'info3@' * | cut -f 1 -d : | tr \\012 \\40 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIME1pW024484 hBIME1pW024484 hBIME1pW024484 hBIMZFpW025094 hBIMZFpW025094 hBIMZFpW025094 hBINOYpW026189 hBINOYpW026189 hBINOYpW026189 [root@ntlh spam]# grep 'info3@' * | cut -f 1 -d : | tr \\012 \\40 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIME1pW024484 hBIME1pW024484 hBIME1pW024484 hBIMZFpW025094 hBIMZFpW025094 hBIMZFpW025094 hBINOYpW026189 hBINOYpW026189 hBINOYpW026189 [root@ntlh spam]# grep 'info3@' * | cut -f 1 -d : | tr \\012 \\40 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIHk1pW014537 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIIIFpW015691 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJjspW018737 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIJTvpW018192 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKCvpW019830 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKmppW020856 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIKRUpW020221 hBIME1pW024484 hBIME1pW024484 hBIME1pW024484 hBIMZFpW025094 hBIMZFpW025094 hBIMZFpW025094 hBINOYpW026189 hBINOYpW026189 hBINOYpW026189 Both of the grep lines work equally well on my RH9 system. Since I was initally looking for the shortest, I was going to use the above line, but since you experianced problems, I may just put the other into another bash file and end up just doing: spam.spam `find.spam info3@` Just create the find.spam file the same as the spam.spam and spam.ham files. As far as the 1024 arg limit: I'm running the stock RH9 kernel, so this may be a problem. Could you explain further how I could use xargs to do the same? I'm not writing directly to a file, inside the spam.spam and spam.ham files is the command sa-learn which reads all of the arguments passed into it as filenames. So I'm still working with the limitation unless I rewrite sa-learn, correct? I'm not sure if you have used sa-learn, but it is called like: sa-learn --spam --(other args) file1 file2 file3 file4 ..... The filenames are what I'm passing into it via the grep commands. Thanks, Jake McHenry Nittany Travel MIS Coordinator http://www.nittanytravel.com -- Shrike-list mailing list Shrike-list@xxxxxxxxxx https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/shrike-list
