STRING-SPLIT(1)

NAME
string-split - split strings by delimiter

SYNOPSIS
string split [(-f | --fields) FIELDS] [(-m | --max) MAX] [-n | --no-empty]
             [-q | --quiet] [-r | --right] SEP [STRING ...]
string split0 [(-f | --fields) FIELDS] [(-m | --max) MAX] [-n | --no-empty]
              [-q | --quiet] [-r | --right] [STRING ...]

DESCRIPTION

string split splits each STRING on the separator SEP, which can be an empty string. If -m or --max is specified, at most MAX splits are done on each STRING. If -r or --right is given, splitting is performed right-to-left. This is useful in combination with -m or --max. With -n or --no-empty, empty results are excluded from consideration (e.g. hello\n\nworld would expand to two strings and not three). Exit status: 0 if at least one split was performed, or 1 otherwise.

Use -f or --fields to print out specific fields. FIELDS is a comma-separated string of field numbers and/or spans. Each field is one-indexed, and will be printed on separate lines. If a given field does not exist, then the command exits with status 1 and does not print anything, unless --allow-empty is used.

See also the --delimiter option of the read command.

string split0 splits each STRING on the zero byte (NUL). Options are the same as string split except that no separator is given.

split0 has the important property that its output is not further split when used in a command substitution, allowing for the command substitution to produce elements containing newlines. This is most useful when used with Unix tools that produce zero bytes, such as find -print0 or sort -z. See split0 examples below.

Be aware that commandline arguments cannot include NULs, so you likely want to pass to string split0 via a pipe, not a command substitution.

EXAMPLES

>_ string split . example.com
example
com
>_ string split -r -m1 / /usr/local/bin/fish
/usr/local/bin
fish
>_ string split '' abc
a
b
c
>_ string split --allow-empty -f1,3-4,5 '' abcd
a
c
d

  NUL Delimited Examples

>_ # Count files in a directory, without being confused by newlines.
>_ # Note: Don't use `string split0 (find . -print0)`, because arguments cannot include NUL.
>_ count (find . -print0 | string split0)
42
>_ # Sort a list of elements which may contain newlines
>_ set foo beta alpha\ngamma
>_ set foo (string join0 $foo | sort -z | string split0)
>_ string escape $foo[1]
alpha\ngamma

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