Replace text using sed

Question

i am having trouble replacing the modified date in my script via sed.

I am getting the last modified date like this:

olddate=`grep -m1 "Built " script.sh | cut -c 22-29`

I get the current date with:

newdate=`date +%d/%m/%y`

Basically i want to replace old date with new date

sed -i "" "s/$olddate/$newdate/g" script.sh

But this doesn't work as the date contains slashes. I've looked around and i can't find the way to escape them properly. Any help would be appreciated.

grep [...] | cut [...] is often better expressed using awk (and saves you a pipe) — johnsyweb
– johnsyweb, Commented Sep 27, 2011 at 9:45
In this case, awk '/Built / { print substr($0, 22, 8); exit }' script.sh — johnsyweb
– johnsyweb, Commented Sep 27, 2011 at 10:10

Matthew Farwell · Accepted Answer · 2011-09-27 09:55:32Z

6

You can use separators other than slashes, for instance ";"

sed -i "" "s;$olddate;$newdate;g" script.sh

edited Sep 27, 2011 at 9:55

answered Sep 27, 2011 at 9:42

Matthew Farwell

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1 Comment

Josh Fradley Over a year ago

Perfect. Thanks for such a quick response!

VGE · Accepted Answer · 2011-09-27 09:42:04Z

3

Use , instead of / !

sed -i "" "s,$olddate,$newdate,g" script.sh

In fact you can use almost any char as separators.

answered Sep 27, 2011 at 9:42

VGE

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Comments

Kent · Accepted Answer · 2011-09-27 09:43:31Z

2

use sed "s#$olddate#$newdate#g"

that should work

answered Sep 27, 2011 at 9:43

Kent

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