ed(1) ed(1)
NAME [Toc] [Back]
ed, red - line-oriented text editor
SYNOPSIS [Toc] [Back]
ed [-p string] [-s|-] [-x] [file]
red [-p string] [-s|-] [-x] [file]
DESCRIPTION [Toc] [Back]
The ed command executes a line-oriented text editor. It is most
commonly used in scripts and noninteractive editing applications
because, even though it can be used interactively, other editors such
as vi and ex are typically easier to use in an interactive
environment.
If file is specified, ed performs an e command (see below) on the
named file; that is to say, the file is read into ed's buffer so that
it can be edited.
Options [Toc] [Back]
The following options are recognized:
-p string Use string as the prompt string when in command mode.
By default, there is no prompt string.
-s|- Suppress printing of byte counts by e, E, r, and w
commands, and suppress the ! prompt after a !
command. The - option is obsolescent and will be
removed in a future release.
-x Perform an X command first to handle an encrypted
file.
File Handling [Toc] [Back]
ed operates on a copy of the file it is editing; changes made to the
copy have no effect on the original file until a w (write) command is
given. The copy of the text being edited resides in a temporary file
called the buffer. There is only one buffer.
red is a restricted version of ed that only allows editing of files in
the current directory and prohibits executing shell commands via
!shell-command. Attempts to bypass these restrictions result in the
error message restricted shell.
Both ed and red support the fspec(4) formatting capability. After
including a format specification as the first line of file and
invoking ed with the controlling terminal in stty -tabs or stty tab3
mode (see stty(1)), the specified tab stops are automatically used
when scanning file. For example, if the first line of a file
contained
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<:t5,10,15 s72:>
the tab stops would be set at columns 5, 10, and 15, and a maximum
line length of 72 would be imposed.
Note: When you input text, ed expands tab characters as they are typed
to every eighth column as a default.
Editor Commands Structure [Toc] [Back]
Commands to ed have a simple and regular structure: zero, one, or two
addresses followed by a single-character command, possibly followed by
parameters to that command. These addresses specify one or more lines
in the buffer. Every command that requires addresses has default
addresses, so that the addresses can very often be omitted.
In general, only one command is allowed on a line. Append, change,
and insert commands accept text input which is then placed in the
buffer as appropriate. While ed is accepting text following an
append, change, or insert command, it is said to be in input mode.
While in input mode, no editor commands are recognized; all input is
merely collected. To terminate input mode, type a period (.) alone at
the beginning of a line.
Regular Expressions [Toc] [Back]
ed supports the Basic Regular Expression (RE) syntax (see regexp(5)),
with the following additions:
+ The null RE (for example, //) is equivalent to the last RE
encountered.
+ If the closing delimiter of an RE or of a replacement string
(for example, /) would be the last character before a newline,
that delimiter can be omitted, in which case the addressed
line is printed. The following pairs of commands are
equivalent:
s/s1/s2 g/s1 ?s1
s/s1/s2/p g/s1/p ?s1?
Line Addresses [Toc] [Back]
To understand line addressing, remember that ed maintains a pointer to
the current line. Generally speaking, the current line is the last
line affected by a command. The exact effect of a given command on
the current line is discussed under the description of each command.
Addresses are interpreted according to the following rules:
1. The character . refers to the current line.
2. The character $ refers to the last line of the buffer.
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3. A decimal number n refers to the nth line of the buffer.
4. A 'x refers to the line marked with the mark name character
x, which must be a lower-case letter. Lines are marked with
the k command described below.
5. An RE enclosed by slashes (/RE/) refers to the first line
found by searching forward from the line following the
current line toward the end of the buffer and stopping at the
first line containing a string matching the RE. If
necessary, the search wraps around to the beginning of the
buffer and continues up to and including the current line, so
that the entire buffer is searched. (Also see WARNINGS
below.)
6. An RE enclosed by question marks (?RE?) addresses the first
line found by searching backward from the line preceding the
current line toward the beginning of the buffer and stopping
at the first line containing a string matching the RE. If
necessary, the search wraps around to the end of the buffer
and continues up to and including the current line. (Also
see WARNINGS below.)
7. An address followed by a plus (+) or minus (-) sign followed
by a decimal number specifies that address plus or minus the
indicated number of lines. The plus sign can be omitted.
8. If an address begins with + or -, the addition or subtraction
is calculated with respect to the current line. For example,
-5 is interpreted as .-5.
9. If an address ends with + or -, 1 is added to or subtracted
from the address, respectively. As a consequence of this and
rule 8 above, the address - refers to the line preceding the
current line. (To maintain compatibility with earlier
versions of the editor, the circumflex (^) and - characters
are interpreted identically when encountered in addresses.)
Moreover, multiple trailing + and - characters have a
cumulative effect, so -- refers to the second line preceding
the current line.
10. For convenience, a comma (,) represents the address pair 1,$,
while a semicolon (;) represents the pair .,$.
Commands require zero, one, or two addresses. Commands that do not
use addresses treat the presence of an address as an error. Commands
that accept one or two addresses assume default addresses when the
number of addresses specified is insufficient. If more addresses are
specified than a given command requires, the last one or two are used
as appropriate.
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Addresses are usually separated from each other by a comma (,). They
can also be separated by a semicolon (;), in which case the current
line (.) is set to the first address, after which the second address
is calculated. This feature can be used to determine the starting
line for forward and backward searches (see rules 5 and 6 above). The
second address of any two-address sequence must correspond to a line
in the buffer that follows the line corresponding to the first
address.
Editor Commands [Toc] [Back]
In the following list of ed commands, the default addresses are shown
in parentheses (parentheses are not part of the address and should not
be placed in an actual command except for other purposes).
It is generally illegal for more than one command to appear on a line.
However, any command (except e, f, r, or w) can be suffixed by l, n,
or p in which case the current line is respectively either listed,
numbered, or printed, as discussed below under the l, n, and p
commands.
(.)a The a (append) command reads text and appends it after
text the addressed line. Upon completion, the new current
. line is the last inserted line, or, if no text was
added, at the addressed line. Address 0 is legal for
this command, causing the appended text to be placed at
the beginning of the buffer.
(.,.)c The c (change) command deletes the addressed lines then
text accepts input text to replace the deleted lines. Upon
. completion, the new current line is the last line in
text or, if no text was provided, at the first line
after the deleted line or lines.
(.,.)d The d (delete) command deletes the addressed lines from
the buffer. Upon completion, the new current line is
the first line following the deleted text, or the last
line in the file if the deleted line or lines were at
the end of the buffer.
e file The e (edit) command deletes the entire contents of the
buffer, then reads in the named file. Upon completion,
the new current line is the last line in the buffer.
If no file name is given, the remembered file name, if
any, is used (see the f command). The number of
characters read is displayed, and file is remembered
for possible use as a default file name in subsequent
e, r, or w commands.
If the file name starts with !, the rest of the line is
interpreted as a shell command whose standard output is
to be read. Such a shell command is not remembered as
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the current file name.
Also see DIAGNOSTICS below.
E file The E (forced edit) command is identical to e except
that no check is made to ensure that the current buffer
has not been altered since the last w command.
f file If file is specified, the f (file name) command changes
the remembered file name to file. Otherwise, it prints
the remembered file name.
(1,$)g/RE/command-list
The g (global) command first marks every line that
matches the given RE. Then, for every such line, the
given command-list is executed with the current line
initially set to that line. A single command or the
first of a list of commands appears on the same line as
the global command. All lines of a multiple-line list
except the last line must end with a backslash (\). a,
i, and c commands and associated input are permitted.
The . that normally terminates input mode can be
omitted if it would be the last line of the command-
list. An empty command-list is equivalent to the p
command. The g, G, v, and V commands are not permitted
in the command-list. (Also see WARNINGS below.)
(1,$)G/RE/ The interactive G (Global) command first marks every
line that matches the given RE. Then, for every such
line, the line is printed, then the current line is
changed to that line and one command (other than a, c,
i, g, G, v, or V) can be input and executed. After
executing that command, the next marked line is
printed, and so on. A newline character acts as a null
command, and an & causes the re-execution of the most
recent command executed within the current invocation
of G. Note that the commands input as part of the
execution of the G command may address and affect any
lines in the buffer. The G command can be terminated
by an interrupt signal (ASCII DEL or BREAK).
h The h (help) command gives a short error message
explaining the reason for the most recent ? diagnostic.
H The H (Help) command causes ed to enter a mode in which
error messages are printed for all subsequent ?
diagnostics. It also explains the previous ? if there
was one. The H command alternately turns this mode on
and off. Initially, it is off.
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(.)i The i (insert) command inserts the given text before
text the addressed line. Upon completion, the current line
. is the last inserted line, or, if there were none, the
addressed line. This command differs from the a
command only in the placement of the input text.
Address 0 is not legal for this command.
(.,.+1)j The j (join) command joins contiguous lines by removing
the appropriate newline characters. If exactly one
address is given, this command does nothing.
(.)kx The k (mark) command marks the addressed line with the
name x, which must be a lower-case letter. The address
'x then addresses this line. Upon completion, the new
current line remains unchanged from before.
(.,.)l The l (list) command writes the addressed lines to
standard output in a visually unambiguous form.
Characters listed in the following table are written as
the corresponding escape sequence. Nonprintable
characters not in the table are written as a threedigit
octal number (with a preceding backslash
character) for each byte in the character (most
significant byte first).
Long lines are folded with the point of folding
indicated by writing a backslash character followed by
a newline. The end of each line is marked with a $.
An l (ell) command can be appended to any command other
than e, E, f, q, Q, r, w, or !. The current line
number is set to the address of the last line written.
Escape ASCII | Escape ASCII
Sequence Represents Name | Sequence Represents Name
\\ backslash \ | \r carriage return CR
\a alert BEL | \t horizontal tab HT
\b backspace BS | \v vertical tab VT
\f formfeed FF |
(.,.)ma The m (move) command repositions the addressed lines
after the line addressed by a. Address 0 is legal for
a, causing the addressed lines to be moved to the
beginning of the file. It is an error if address a
falls within the range of moved lines; Upon completion,
the new current line is the last line moved.
(.,.)n The n (number) command prints the addressed lines,
preceding each line by its line number and a tab
character. Upon completion, the new current line is
the last line printed. The n command can be appended
to any command other than e, f, r, or w.
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(.,.)p The p (print) command prints the addressed lines. Upon
completion, the new current line is the last line
printed. The p command may be appended to any other
command other than e, E, f, q, Q, r, w, or !. For
example, dp deletes the current line and prints the new
current line.
P The P (prompt) command causes ed to prompt with an
asterisk (*) (or with string if the -p option was
specified in the command line) for all subsequent
commands. The P command alternately turns this mode on
and off. It is initially on if the -p option was
specified; otherwise, off. The current line number is
unchanged.
q The q (quit) command causes ed to exit. No automatic
write of a file is done (but see DIAGNOSTICS below).
Q The editor exits unconditionally without checking for
changes in the buffer since the last w command.
($)r file The r (read) command reads the specified file into the
buffer after the addressed line. If no file name is
given, the remembered file name, if any, is used (see
the e and f commands). The remembered file name is not
changed unless file is the very first file name
mentioned since ed was invoked. Address 0 is legal for
r and places the contents of file at the beginning of
the buffer. If the read is successful, the number of
characters read is displayed. Upon completion, the new
current line is the last line read into the buffer. If
the file name starts with !, the rest of the line is
interpreted as a shell command whose standard output is
to be read. For example, $r !ls appends a listing of
files in the current directory to the end of the file
being edited. A shell command is not remembered as the
current file name.
(.,.)s/RE/replacement/flags
The s (substitute) command searches each addressed line
for an occurrence of the specified RE. In each line in
which a match is found, all (nonoverlapped) matched
strings are replaced by replacement if the global
replacement indicator g appears after the command. If
the global indicator does not appear, only the first
occurrence of the matched string is replaced. If a
number n appears after the command, only the nth
occurrence of the matched string on each addressed line
is replaced. It is an error for the substitution to
fail on all addressed lines. Any character other than
space or newline can be used instead of / to delimit
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the RE and replacement. Upon completion, the new
current line is the last line on which a substitution
occurred. (Also see WARNINGS below.)
If an ampersand (&) appears in replacement, it is
replaced by the string matching the RE on the current
line. The special meaning of & in this context can be
suppressed by preceding it with \.
As a more general feature, the characters \n, where n
is a digit, are replaced by the text matched by the nth
regular subexpression of the specified RE enclosed
between \( and \). When nested parenthesized
subexpressions are present, n is determined by counting
occurrences of \(, starting from the left.
When the character % is the only character in
replacement, the replacement used in the most recent
substitute command is used as the replacement in the
current substitute command. The % loses its special
meaning when it is in a replacement string containing
more than one character or when preceded by a \.
A line can be split by substituting a newline character
into it. The newline in replacement must be escaped by
preceding it by \. Such substitution cannot be done as
part of a g or v command list.
The value of flags is zero or more of:
n Substitute for the nth occurrence only of the
RE found on each addressed line.
g Substitute for all nonoverlapped occurrences
of the RE on each addressed line.
l Write to standard output the final line in
which a substitution was made. The line is
written in the format specified for the l
command.
n Write to standard output the final line in
which a substitution was made. The line is
written in the format specified for the n
command.
p Write to standard output the final line in
which a substitution was made. The line is
written in the format specified for the p
command.
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(.,.)ta Same as m command, except that a copy of the addressed
lines is placed after address a (which can be 0). Upon
completion, the new current line is the last line of
the copy.
u The u (undo) command nullifies the effect of the most
recent command that modified anything in the buffer,
that is, the most recent a, c, d, g, G, i, j, m, r, s,
t, v, or V command. All changes made to the buffer by
a g, G, v, or V global command are "undone" as a single
change; if no changes were made by the global command
(such as with g/RE/p), the u command has no effect.
The current line number is set to the value it had
immediately before the command started.
(1,$)v/RE/command-list
The complement of the global command g in that the
lines marked during the first step are those that do
not match the RE.
(1,$)V/RE/ The complement of the interactive global command G in
that the lines marked during the first step are those
that do not match the RE.
(1,$)w file The w (write) command writes the addressed lines into
the named file. If the file does not exist, it is
created with mode 666 (readable and writable by
everyone), unless the current umask setting dictates
otherwise (see umask(1). The remembered file name is
not changed unless file is the very first file name
encountered since ed was invoked. If no file name is
given, the remembered file name, if any, is used (see
the e and f commands). Upon completion, the current
line address is unchanged. If the command is
successful, the number of characters written is
displayed.
If the file name starts with !, the rest of the line is
interpreted as a shell command whose standard input is
the addressed lines. Such a shell command is not
remembered as the current file name.
X A key string is demanded from the standard input.
Subsequent e, r, and w commands will encrypt and
decrypt the text with this key, using the algorithm of
crypt(1). An explicitly empty key turns off
encryption.
($)= The line number of the addressed line is displayed.
The current line address is unchanged by this command.
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!shell-command The remainder of the line after the ! is sent to the
shell to be interpreted and executed as a command.
Within the text of that command, the unescaped
character % is replaced with the remembered file name.
If a ! appears as the first character of the shell
command, it is replaced with the text of the previous
shell command. Thus, !! repeats the last shell
command. If any expansion is performed, the expanded
line is echoed. Upon completion, the current line
address is unchanged.
(.+1) newline An address alone on a line causes the addressed line to
be printed. A newline alone is equivalent to .+1p.
This technique is useful for stepping forward through
the buffer.
If an interrupt signal (ASCII DEL or BREAK) is sent, ed prints a ? and
returns to its command level.
The following size limitations apply: 256 characters per global
command list, 64 characters per file name, and 32 MB characters in the
buffer. The limit on the number of lines depends on the amount of
user memory: each line takes 1 word.
EXTERNAL INFLUENCES [Toc] [Back]
Environment Variables
SHELL determines the preferred command-line interpreter for use in all
!-style commands. If this variable is null or not set, the POSIX
shell, /usr/bin/sh, is used (see sh-posix(1)).
When set, TMPDIR specifies a directory to be used for temporary files,
overriding the default directory, /tmp.
LANG provides a default value for internationalization variables that
are unset or null. If LANG is unset or null, the default value is "C"
(see lang(5)). If any internationalization variable contains an
invalid setting, all internationalization variables default to "C".
See environ(5).
If LC_ALL is set to a nonempty string value, it overrides the values
of all the other internationalization variables, including LANG.
LC_CTYPE determines the interpretation of text as single- and/or
multibyte characters, the classification of characters as printable,
and the characters matched by character class expressions in regular
expressions.
LC_MESSAGES determines the locale that should be used to affect the
format and contents of diagnostic messages written to standard error
and informative messages written to standard output.
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NLSPATH determines the location of message catalogues for the
processing of LC_MESSAGES.
International Code Set Support [Toc] [Back]
Single- and multibyte character code sets are supported.
DIAGNOSTICS [Toc] [Back]
? Command error. Use h or H to get a detailed explanation.
?file Inaccessible file. Use h or H to get a detailed
explanation.
If changes have been made in the buffer since the last w command that
wrote the entire buffer, ed warns you if you attempt to destroy the
buffer with an e or q command. ed displays ? or warning: expecting
`w', then continues normal editing unless you enter a second e or q
command, in which case the second command is executed. The -s or -
command-line option inhibits this feature.
EXAMPLES [Toc] [Back]
Make a simple substitution in file-1 from a shell script, changing the
first occurrence of abc in any line to xyz, and save the changes in
file-2.
cat - << EOF | ed -s file-1
1,$ s/abc/xyz/
w file-2
q
EOF
Note that, if a command fails, the editor exits immediately.
WARNINGS [Toc] [Back]
ed(1) allows a Maximum Line Length of 4096 characters. Attempting to
create lines longer than the allowable limit causes ed(1) to produce a
Line too long error message.
A ! command cannot be subject to a g or a v command.
The ! command and the ! escape from the e, r, and w commands cannot be
used if the the editor is invoked from a restricted shell (see sh(1)).
The sequence \n in a regular expression does not match a newline
character.
The l command does not handle DEL correctly.
Files encrypted directly with the crypt command with the null key
cannot be edited (see crypt(1)).
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If the editor input is coming from a command file (e.g., ed file <
ed-cmd-file), the editor exits at the first failure of a command in
the command file.
When reading a file, ed discards ASCII NUL characters and all
characters after the last newline. This can cause unexpected behavior
when using regular expressions to search for character sequences
containing NUL characters or text near end-of-file.
AUTHOR [Toc] [Back]
ed was developed by HP and OSF.
FILES [Toc] [Back]
/tmp/ep Temporary buffer file where p is the process number.
ed.hup Work is saved here if the terminal is hung up.
SEE ALSO [Toc] [Back]
awk(1), csh(1), crypt(1), ex(1), grep(1), ksh(1), sed(1), sh(1), shposix(1), stty(1), vi(1), fspec(4), environ(5), lang(5), regexp(5).
The ed section in Text Processing: User's Guide.
STANDARDS CONFORMANCE [Toc] [Back]
ed: SVID2, SVID3, XPG2, XPG3, XPG4, POSIX.2
red: SVID2, SVID3, XPG2, XPG3
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