mjhjmtu

I have a list of data in a table. By using awk to pull out column 5, i was able to differentiate the data amongst the rows. If the entry at column 5 is more than 4, the row should be printed.

However, there is one entry that comes in the form of a string that cannot be directly compared to a number, before deciding whether it should be printed or not. That entry has a parenthesis around the number that should be compared.

Here is the example of the column 5:

on
%)
%
replica
(

0
(100.0 <= this one
0.0
10.8
13.8
12.0
16.3
13.2
12.1
11.4
10.4
0.0
devices:

From the exmaple above, i am suppose to print rows 8 and 10 to 17 of the table.

I will provide a example table(file.txt):

1 0 0 0 on
2 0 0 0 %)
3 0 0 0 %
4 0 0 0 replica
5 0 0 0 (
6 0 0 0 
7 0 0 0 0
8 0 0 0 (100.0
9 0 0 0 0.0
1 0 0 0 10.8
1 1 0 0 13.8
1 2 0 0 12.0
1 3 0 0 16.3
1 4 0 0 13.2
1 5 0 0 12.1
1 6 0 0 11.4
1 7 0 0 10.4
1 8 0 0 0.0
1 9 0 0 devices:

My attempt:

awk '{if (($5>=4)) print;
else
 NUMBER=($5 | grep -o -E '[0-9]+');
 if (($NUMBER>=4)) print' file.txt

Error:

awk: syntax error near line 2
awk: illegal statement near line 2
awk: syntax error near line 3
awk: illegal statement near line 3

You could strip off the non-numeric characters before comparing:

$ awk 'x=$5; gsub(/[^0-9.]/,"",x); x+0>=4' file.txt
8 0 0 0 (100.0
1 0 0 0 10.8
1 1 0 0 13.8
1 2 0 0 12.0
1 3 0 0 16.3
1 4 0 0 13.2
1 5 0 0 12.1
1 6 0 0 11.4
1 7 0 0 10.4