title: Delete a column from a delimited file in linux
body: <p>I have a file in the following format:</p>
  
  <pre><code>col1|col2|col3|col4
  a|b|c|d
  e|f||h
  i|j|k|l
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I would like to delete col3 (with the delimiter "|") from the header and the data as well.  Can this be done using awk/sed?</p>
  
  <p>Plese NOTE that the data in col3 maybe empty (row 2).</p>
  
  <p>The output should be:</p>
  
  <pre><code>col1|col2|col4
  a|b|d
  e|f|h
  i|j|l
  </code></pre>