shell - need to search lines containing specific string pattern -

i checking if current line read awk contains strings using:

if (/.*abc.*lab.*/)  {  }

but if string in line e.g.

[abc ls:lab=123 ....]..

then string searched correctly, if line contains e.g.

[abc ls:key=xyz xyz. ls:lab=123 ...]..

then line not searched though matches .*abc.*lab.*

can please correct me if doing mistake while searching?

you should able use:

awk '/abc.*lab/ { print $0 }'

the pattern matched against $0, whole line. however, wrote should work if written as:

awk '{if (/.*abc.*lab.*/) print $0}'

or simpler regex:

awk '{if (/abc.*lab/) print $0}'

if don't have if inside { ... }, you've got syntactic problems awk.

given data file this:

[abc ls:lab=123 ....].. string searched correctly, if line contains e.g.  [abc ls:key=xyz xyz. ls:lab=123 ...]..

the scripts above produce:

[abc ls:lab=123 ....].. [abc ls:key=xyz xyz. ls:lab=123 ...]..

Brande