Merge multiple consecutive lines
At times there is a need to merge multiple consecutive lines to one. paste command makes it very easy to merge lines.
Syntax: paste -d’,’ – – < input_file
See the example below,
robin@Home-XPS:~$ echo -e '1\n2\n3\n4\n5\n6\n7\n8\n9\n10\n11\n12' 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 robin@Home-XPS:~$ echo -e '1\n2\n3\n4\n5\n6\n7\n8\n9\n10\n11\n12' > test.txt robin@Home-XPS:~$ cat test.txt 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 robin@Home-XPS:~$ paste -d' ' - - < test.txt 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 robin@Home-XPS:~$ paste -d' ' - - - < test.txt 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 robin@Home-XPS:~$