I have written herethe following sample script which readreads file /etc/passwd word by word.
#!/bin/bash
COUNT=1
FCOUNT=`cat /etc/passwd|wc -l`
while [ $COUNT -le $FCOUNT ]
do
FTCOUNT=`awk -F ":" '{print NF,$0}' /etc/passwd|awk '{print $1}'|head -$COUNT|tail -1`
TCOUNT=1
while [ $TCOUNT -le $FTCOUNT ]
do
if [ $TCOUNT -gt $FTCOUNT ]
then
FTCOUNT=""
break
else
OUTPUT=`head -$COUNT /etc/passwd|cut -d ":" -f $TCOUNT|tail -1`
echo -n "${OUTPUT} "
sleep 2
TCOUNT=$(( TCOUNT + 1 ))
fi
done
echo ""
COUNT=$(( COUNT + 1 ))
done