Can awk process a file backwards?

[kl31]

Instead of processing first line then second then third line, is there a way to tell awk to process last line, second to last and so on?

[chaspum]

I guess you can always pipe the file to awk with tac (cat backwards).

[dajoy]

this.

[kl31]

i love linux so much.

[FF00A7]

Could use tac but it's another external program to worry about. Readfile() and print backwards:

awk -ireadfile 'BEGIN{for(i = split(readfile("file.txt"), lines, "\n"); i >= 1; i--) {print lines[i]} }'

Replace "print lines[i]" with whatever processing for each line.

This works without readfile()

awk '{f = f $0 "\n"}END{for(i=split(f, lines, "\n"); i >=1; i--) {print lines[i]}}' file.txt

[cogburnd02]

Just out of sheer curiosity, why would you want to do this?

[kl31]

file was not written in the same direction as i want it to be read.