cut string on last delimiter

Question

I have a filename like a.b.c.txt, I want this string to be split as

string1=a.b.c
string2=txt

Basically I want to split filename and its extension. I used cut but it splits as a,b,c and txt. I want to cut the string on the last delimiter.

Can somebody help?

score 52 · Accepted Answer · answered Jul 22 '15 at 13:31

52

 #For Filename
 echo "a.b.c.txt" | rev | cut -d"." -f2-  | rev
 #For extension
 echo "a.b.c.txt" | rev | cut -d"." -f1  | rev

answered Jul 22 '15 at 13:31

jijinp

1,361
9
10

Beauty of code! – Nam G VU Jan 26 '20 at 05:42
old school unix classic way – Merlin Jun 19 '20 at 20:03
rev is really smart – Alvin Smith Mar 22 '22 at 09:07

score 18 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 22 '15 at 13:34

18

There are many tools to do this.

As you were using cut :

$ string1="$(cut -d. -f1-3 <<<'a.b.c.txt')"
$ string2="$(cut -d. -f4 <<<'a.b.c.txt')"
$ echo "$string1"
a.b.c
$ echo "$string2"
txt

I would have used parameter expansion (if the shell supports it) :

$ name='a.b.c.txt'
$ string1="${name%.*}"
$ string2="${name##*.}"
$ echo "$string1"
a.b.c
$ echo "$string2"
txt

answered Jul 22 '15 at 13:34

heemayl

54,820
8
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141

2

the bash solution is elegant. – törzsmókus Aug 08 '17 at 13:50
3

the _cut_ one does only work with a fixed number of periods! – törzsmókus Aug 08 '17 at 13:50

score 2 · Answer 3 · edited Apr 13 '18 at 11:02

2

echo "a.b.c.txt" | cut -d. -f1-3

cut command will delimit . and will give you 4 factors (a, b, c, txt). Above command will print factor 1 to 3 (included).

Or:

echo "a.b.c.txt" | cut -d -f-3

Above command will print factor 1 till 3 (included).

edited Apr 13 '18 at 11:02

Yurij Goncharuk

4,177
2
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36

answered Apr 13 '18 at 10:17

Rohit Chaudhari

21
2

cut string on last delimiter

3 Answers3