If you get to the point when you need to write IFS=$'\v' read -d '' -ra a < <(printf '%s\v' "$s") it is a good sign that it's time to switch to some other

If you get to the point when you need to write IFS=$'\v' read -d '' -ra a < <(printf '%s\v' "$s") it is a good sign that it's time to switch to some other language. For example in python, it will be just a = s.split("\v") (and yes, sometime you have legacy system, or writing initrd script. But how often does this happen? Any why does your initrd has full bash anyway, as opposed to dash or sh?)