Linux in a Nutshell, 6th Edition

Name

system

Synopsis

system(command)

Function that executes the specified command and returns its exit status. The status of the executed command typically indicates success or failure. A value of 0 means that the command executed successfully. A nonzero value indicates a failure of some sort. The documentation for the command will give you the details.

awk does not make the output of the command available for processing within the awk script. Use command | getline to read the output of a command into the script.