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Other Features of awk

The awk language provides a number of predefined, or built-in, variables that your programs can use to get information from awk. There are other variables your program can set as well to control how awk processes your data.

In addition, awk provides a number of built-in functions for doing common computational and string-related operations. gawk provides built-in functions for working with timestamps, performing bit manipulation, and for runtime string translation.

As we develop our presentation of the awk language, we introduce most of the variables and many of the functions. They are defined systematically in Built-in Variables, and Built-in Functions.