Print a file in multiple columns based on delimiter

Question

This seems like a simple task, but using duckduckgo I wasn\'t able to find a way to properly do what I\'m trying to.

The main question is: How do I split the output of a

Answer 1

This script is getting max width of current terminal and splitting it in 2, then printing records split by RS="\n\n" separator, print the first found and placing the cursor at the first line/last column of it to write the next record.

#!/bin/bash

tput clear
# get half current terminal width
twidth=$(($(tput cols)/2))

tail -n 100 -f test.txt | stdbuf -i0 -o0 gawk -v twidth=$twidth 'BEGIN{ RS="\n\n"; FS=OFS="\n"; oldNF=0 } {
    sep="-----------------------------------"
    pad="                    "
    printf "%-" twidth "s", $0

    getline

    for(i = 1; i <= NF; i++){
    # move cursor to first line, last column of previous record
    print "\033[" oldNF ";" twidth "f" $i
    oldNF+=1
    }
}'

Here's a simpler version

gawk 'BEGIN{ RS="[-]+\n\n"; FS="\n" } {
    sep="-----------------------------------"
    le=$2
    lo=$3
    getline

    printf "%-40s %-40s\n", sep,sep
    printf "%-40s %-40s\n", le,$2
    printf "%-40s %-40s\n", lo,$3
    printf "%-40s %-40s\n\n", sep,sep
}' test.txt

Output

-----------------------------------      -----------------------------------     
Some data                                More data that is seperated             
that varies in line length               by a new line and dashes                
-----------------------------------      -----------------------------------     

-----------------------------------      -----------------------------------     
Some data                                More data that is seperated             
that varies in line length               by a new line and dashes                
-----------------------------------      -----------------------------------