gawk: Names
1
1 A Rose by Any Other Name
1 ========================
1
1 The 'awk' language has evolved over the years. Full details are
1 provided in ⇒Language History. The language described in this
1 Info file is often referred to as "new 'awk'." By analogy, the original
1 version of 'awk' is referred to as "old 'awk'."
1
1 On most current systems, when you run the 'awk' utility you get some
1 version of new 'awk'.(1) If your system's standard 'awk' is the old
1 one, you will see something like this if you try the test program:
1
1 $ awk 1 /dev/null
1 error-> awk: syntax error near line 1
1 error-> awk: bailing out near line 1
1
1 In this case, you should find a version of new 'awk', or just install
1 'gawk'!
1
1 Throughout this Info file, whenever we refer to a language feature
1 that should be available in any complete implementation of POSIX 'awk',
1 we simply use the term 'awk'. When referring to a feature that is
1 specific to the GNU implementation, we use the term 'gawk'.
1
1 ---------- Footnotes ----------
1
1 (1) Only Solaris systems still use an old 'awk' for the default 'awk'
1 utility. A more modern 'awk' lives in '/usr/xpg6/bin' on these systems.
1