[SOLVED]deleting text with sed

sven · 2005-10-24 18:16:08

I would like to use sed to delete text that is between "anchor" tags, like this:

#startIncludeRules
the text
on
multiple lines
#endIncludeRules

How would that succeed using sed?

T-Dawg · 2005-10-24 19:00:06

how's this for ugly?

i=(`grep -n IncludeRules name_of_file |awk -F: {'print $1'}`)
 i[0]=$((${i[0]}+1))
 i[1]=$((${i[1]}-1))
sed "${i[0]},${i[1]}"d -i name_of_file

smoon · 2005-10-24 20:35:20

sed -e 's/^[^#].*//;/^$/d'

should remove every line that does not start with a #, maybe that's already enough?

sven · 2005-10-25 11:18:11

Thanks,Penguin and smoon

Removing # - lines is not enough,though - it is a configuration file that has other importan lines, too.

Penguin,your commands gave an error:
sed: -e expression #1, char 3: unexpected `,'

T-Dawg · 2005-10-25 11:30:26

sven wrote:

Thanks,Penguin and smoon
Removing # - lines is not enough,though - it is a configuration file that has other importan lines, too.
Penguin,your commands gave an error:
sed: -e expression #1, char 3: unexpected `,'

I get that error to if I don't change "name_of_file" instances to the actual complete path to my file. Did you do that?

sven · 2005-10-25 11:53:31

yes, I tried now with full path, too - and still got that error

T-Dawg · 2005-10-25 15:07:41

I can't figure out why that wont work for you. When I was testing it, I was using !#/bin/bash instead of !#/bin/sh.
What I gave you will grep any line with IncludeRules in it and delete everything between the two points. The first line may be failing. You could echo ${i[@]} after that first line to see if it actually did something and go from there.

Sorry, I can't think of an easier way to do this.

sven · 2005-10-25 17:30:10

First two lines seem to work nicely, the final value of $i is 2. echo ${i[@]} returns 2 -1.

T-Dawg · 2005-10-25 18:33:49

yeah it looks like ifs finding the start tag but no the end tag. Could you post this file so I can get a better understanding of whats going on?

sven · 2005-10-25 18:33:57

I found another way I got help from a Gentoo sed Wiki

sed -e '/#startIncludeRules/,/#endIncludeRules/d' testfile | more > testfile

sven · 2005-10-25 18:35:16

My test file is this:

testing123
12
3
#startIncludeRules
fds
dsf
dsf
sf
sd
fs
dfdsfdsf
#endIncludeRules
sfds
fdsf
dsf
dsf
sd

T-Dawg · 2005-10-25 18:36:30

ah. I thought you wanted to leave the tags but delete lines between them.

T-Dawg · 2005-10-25 18:43:28

sven wrote:

My test file is this:
testing123
12
3
#startIncludeRules
fds
dsf
dsf
sf
sd
fs
dfdsfdsf
#endIncludeRules
sfds
fdsf
dsf
dsf
sd

even this worked for me :?
Oh well, glad you got it figured.

Arch Linux

#1 2005-10-24 18:16:08

[SOLVED]deleting text with sed

#2 2005-10-24 19:00:06

Re: [SOLVED]deleting text with sed

#3 2005-10-24 20:35:20

Re: [SOLVED]deleting text with sed

#4 2005-10-25 11:18:11

Re: [SOLVED]deleting text with sed

#5 2005-10-25 11:30:26

Re: [SOLVED]deleting text with sed

#6 2005-10-25 11:53:31

Re: [SOLVED]deleting text with sed

#7 2005-10-25 15:07:41

Re: [SOLVED]deleting text with sed

#8 2005-10-25 17:30:10

Re: [SOLVED]deleting text with sed

#9 2005-10-25 18:33:49

Re: [SOLVED]deleting text with sed

#10 2005-10-25 18:33:57

Re: [SOLVED]deleting text with sed

#11 2005-10-25 18:35:16

Re: [SOLVED]deleting text with sed

#12 2005-10-25 18:36:30

Re: [SOLVED]deleting text with sed

#13 2005-10-25 18:43:28

Re: [SOLVED]deleting text with sed

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