I am trying to replace a line of commented text in a file with nothing, using perl. Like this:
## Some text ##
I tried this command:
perl -p -i -e 's/## Some text ##//g' file.php
But that didn't work. Is there any way to do it with blank spaces that are that long?
If you want to keep the line, but remove the text:
$ perl -pi -e 's/## Some text\s+##//'
If you want to remove the line completely:
$ perl -ni -e 'print unless /## Some text\s+##/'
If you want to remove all lines that are only comments and that comments are created with a leading # character then all you have to do is:
perl -i -ne 'print unless (m/^\s*#/);' file_name
the m match uses ^ (beginning of line) \s* (zero or more white spaces)
If on the other hand you want to remove that specific line, then use -n instead of -p like this:
perl -i -ne 'print unless (m//## Some text #/);' file_name
The reason your code didn't "work" is that the -p option is always going to give you a print.
Type:
perldoc perlrequick
and
perldoc perlretut
for more information on reg. expressions. Type:
perldoc perlrun
for more information on -n and -p options.
Related
I need to deactivate certain lines in a file that starts with * by putting # at the front of the line.
At first, sed -i 's/*/#*/g' tmp.conf seems to work. But it adds # as many as I run the command.
user#host:/etc/security/limits.d:$ cat tmp.conf
#* soft nproc 4096
root soft nproc unlimited
user#host:/etc/security/limits.d:$ sudo sed -i 's/*/#*/g' tmp.conf
user#host:/etc/security/limits.d:$ cat tmp.conf
##* soft nproc 4096
root soft nproc unlimited
So it has to ignore when the line starts with #, otherwise put # at the front.
I searched to come up with sed -i 's/^(?!#)\*/#*/g' tmp.conf, which doesn't work.
What regex should I use to find *, not #*?
Or is there any other way to do this other than using sed?
Maybe with this?
sed 's/^\*/#&/'
Use this Perl one-liner:
perl -i.bak -pe 's{^[*]}{#*}' test.txt
It will not add extra # characters to lines that already have one. And it can be run multiple times on the file, and it will not add extra # characters.
Example:
$ echo "*1\n#*2\n3" > test.txt
# cat test.txt
#*1
#*2
3
$ perl -i.bak -pe 's{^[*]}{#*}' test.txt
$ cat test.txt
#*1
#*2
3
The Perl one-liner uses these command line flags:
-e : Tells Perl to look for code in-line, instead of in a file.
-p : Loop over the input one line at a time, assigning it to $_ by default. Add print $_ after each loop iteration.
-i.bak : Edit input files in-place (overwrite the input file). Before overwriting, save a backup copy of the original file by appending to its name the extension .bak. If you want to skip writing a backup file, just use -i and skip the extension.
s{^[*]}{#*} : replace a literal * at the beginning of the line (^) with #*. Note that * has a special meaning (0 or more repetitions of the preceding character) and must be either escaped like so: \* or placed inside a character class like so: [*].
SEE ALSO:
perldoc perlrun: how to execute the Perl interpreter: command line switches
perldoc perlre: Perl regular expressions (regexes)
perldoc perlre: Perl regular expressions (regexes): Quantifiers; Character Classes and other Special Escapes; Assertions; Capture groups
perldoc perlrequick: Perl regular expressions quick start
I have two regular expressions:
$ grep -E '\-\- .*$' *.sql
$ sed -E '\-\- .*$' *.sql
(I am trying to grep lines in sql files that have comments and remove lines in sql files that have comments)
The grep command works using this regex; however, the sed returns the following error:
sed: -e expression #1, char 7: unterminated address regex
What am I doing incorrectly with sed?
(The space after the two hyphens is required for sql comments if you are unfamiliar with MySql comments of this type)
You're trying to use:
sed -E '\-\- .*$' *.sql
Here sed command is not correct because you're not really telling sed to do something.
It should be:
sed -n '/-- /p' *.sql
and equivalent grep would be:
grep -- '-- ' *.sql
or even better with a fixed string search:
grep -F -- '-- ' *.sql
Using -- to separate pattern and arguments in grep command.
There is no need to escape - in a regex if it is outside bracket expression (or character class) i.e. [...].
Based on comments below it seems OP's intent is to remove commented section in all *.sql files that start with 2 hyphens.
You may use this sed for that:
sed -i 's/-- .*//g' *.sql
The problem here is not the regex, the problem is that sed requires a command. The equivalent of your grep would be:
sed -n '/\-\- .*$/p'
You suppress output for non-matching lines -n ... you search (wrap your regex in slashes) and you print p (after the last slash).
P.S.: As Anub pointed out, escaping the hyphens - inside the regex is unnecessary.
You are trying to use sed's \cregexpc syntax where with \-<...> you are telling sed the delimiter character you want use is a dash -, but you didn't terminate it where it should be: \-<...>- also add d command to delete those lines.
sed '\-\-\-.*$-d' infile
see man sed about that:
\cregexpc
Match lines matching the regular expression regexp. The c may be any character.
if default / was used this was not required so:
sed '/--.*$/d' infile
or simply:
sed '/^--/d' infile
and more accurately:
sed '/^[[:blank:]]*--/d' infile
I am trying to find a pattern of two consecutive lines, where the first line is a fixed string and the second has a part substring I like to replace.
This is to be done in sh or bash on macOS.
If I had a regex tool at hand that would operate on the entire text, this would be easy for me. However, all I find is bash's simple text replacement - which doesn't work with regex, and sed, which is line oriented.
I suspect that I can use sed in a way where it first finds a matching first line, and only then looks to replace the following line if its pattern also matches, but I cannot figure this out.
Or are there other tools present on macOS that would let me do a regex-based search-and-replace over an entire file or a string? Maybe with Python (v2.7 and v3 is installed)?
Here's a sample text and how I like it modified:
keyA
value:474
keyB
value:474 <-- only this shall be replaced (follows "keyB")
keyC
value:474
keyB
value:474
Now, I want to find all occurances where the first line is "keyB" and the following one is "value:474", and then replace that second line with another value, e.g. "value:888".
As a regex that ignores line separators, I'd write this:
Search: (\bkeyB\n\s*value):474
Replace: $1:888
So, basically, I find the pattern before the 474, and then replace it with the same pattern plus the new number 888, thereby preserving the original indentation (which is variable).
You can use
sed -e '/keyB$/{n' -e 's/\(.*\):[0-9]*/\1:888/' -e '}' file
# Or, to replace the contents of the file inline in FreeBSD sed:
sed -i '' -e '/keyB$/{n' -e 's/\(.*\):[0-9]*/\1:888/' -e '}' file
Details:
/keyB$/ - finds all lines that end with keyB
n - empties the current pattern space and reads the next line into it
s/\(.*\):[0-9]*/\1:888/ - find any text up to the last : + zero or more digits capturing that text into Group 1, and replaces with the contents of the group and :888.
The {...} create a block that is executed only once the /keyB$/ condition is met.
See an online sed demo.
Use a perl one-liner with -0777 to scan over multiple lines:
$ # inline edit:
$ perl -0777 -i -pe 's/\bkeyB\s*value):\d*/$1:888/' file.txt
$ # to stdout:
$ cat file.txt | perl -0777 -pe 's/\bkeyB\s*value):\d*/$1:888/'
In plain bash:
#!/bin/bash
keypattern='^[[:blank:]]*keyB$'
valpattern='(.*):'
replacement=888
while read -r; do
printf '%s\n' "$REPLY"
if [[ $REPLY =~ $keypattern ]]; then
read -r
if [[ $REPLY =~ $valpattern ]]; then
printf '%s%s\n' "${BASH_REMATCH[0]}" "$replacement"
else
printf '%s\n' "$REPLY"
fi
fi
done < file
I am trying to add 5 blank line spaces in a text file (text.txt) before and after string pattern matches. I used the following to get spaces after the 'string' match which worked for me-
sed '/string/{G;G;G;G;G;}' text.txt
I want to apply the same sed command to obtain 5 blank lines before the 'string' Here I don't want spaces, but rather blank lines before and after them. Any suggestions?
sed -r 's/(^.*)(string)(.*$)/\1\n\n\n\n\n\2\n\n\n\n\n\3/' text.txt
Use -r or -E to allow regular expressions, split likes into three sections and then substitute the line for the first section, 5 new lines, the second section, 5 new lines and then finally the third section.
Use this Perl one-liner:
perl -pe 's/string/\n\n\n\n\n$&\n\n\n\n\n/' text.txt
The Perl one-liner uses these command line flags:
-e : Tells Perl to look for code in-line, instead of in a file.
-p : Loop over the input one line at a time, assigning it to $_ by default. Add print $_ after each loop iteration.
s/PATTERN/REPLACEMENT/ : change PATTERN to REPLACEMENT.
$& : matched pattern.
\n : newline character.
SEE ALSO:
perldoc perlrun: how to execute the Perl interpreter: command line switches
perldoc perlrequick: Perl regular expressions quick start
For a single string match:
$ sed -e '/string/{ s/^/\n\n\n\n\n/; s/$/\n\n\n\n\n/ }' text.txt
For multiple strings, assuming same requirements:
$ sed -E '/(string1|string2|string3)/{ s/^/\n\n\n\n\n/; s/$/\n\n\n\n\n/ }' text.txt
This might work for you:
sed '/string/{G;s/\(string\)\(.*\)\(.\)/\3\3\3\3\3\1\3\3\3\3\3\2/}' file
Match on string, append an empty line, pattern match using the newline to separate the match by 5 lines either side.
And an awk version:
awk '{if(/string1|string2|.../){printf "\n\n\n\n\n%s\n\n\n\n\n",$0}else{print}}' file
Apologies for the simple question. I don't clean text or use regex often.
I have a large number of text files in which I want to remove every line until my regex finds a match. There's usually about 15 lines of fluff before I find a match. I was hoping for a perl one-liner that would look like this:
perl -p -i -e "s/.*By.unanimous.vote//g" *.txt
But this doesn't work.
Thanks
Solution using the flip-flop operator:
perl -pi -e '$_="" unless /By.unanimous.vote/ .. 1' input-files
Shorter solution that also uses the x=!! pseudo operator:
per -pi -e '$_ x=!! (/By.unanimous.vote/ .. 1)' input-files
Have a try with:
If you want to get rid until the last By.unanimous.vote
perl -00 -pe "s/.*By.unanimous.vote//s" inputfile > outputfile
If you want to get rid until the first By.unanimous.vote
perl -00 -pe "s/.*?By.unanimous.vote//s" inputfile > outputfile
Try something like:
perl -pi -e "$a=1 if !$a && /By\.unanimous\.vote/i; s/.*//s if !$a" *.txt
Should remove the lines before the matched line. If you want to remove the matching line also you can do something like:
perl -pi -e "$a=1 if !$a && s/.*By\.unanimous\.vote.*//is; s/.*//s if !$a" *.txt
Shorter versions:
perl -pi -e "$a++if/By\.unanimous\.vote/i;$a||s/.*//s" *.txt
perl -pi -e "$a++if s/.*By\.unanimous\.vote.*//si;$a||s/.*//s" *.txt
You haven't said whether you want to keep the By.unanimous.vote part, but it sounds to me like you want:
s/[\s\S]*?(?=By\.unanimous\.vote)//
Note the missing g flag and the lazy *? quantifier, because you want to stop matching once you hit that string. This should preserve By.unanimous.vote and everything after it. The [\s\S] matches newlines. In Perl, you can also do this with:
s/.*?(?=By\.unanimous\.vote)//s
Solution using awk
awk '/.*By.unanimous.vote/{a=1} a==1{print}' input > output