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    This has the same problem as Antti's solution - if the replacement string is past a certain length, you get a "Argument list too long" error. Also, what if the replacement string has '[', ']', '*', '.', and other such characters? Would sed really not interpret those? Commented Jan 17, 2016 at 17:26
  • The replacement side of s/// is not a regular expression, it's really just a string (except for backslash-escapes and &). If the replacement string is so long, a shell one-liner is not your solution. Commented Jan 17, 2016 at 20:11
  • A very useful list if, for example, your replacement string is base64 encoded text (eg. replacing a placeholder with a SHA256 key). Then it's just the delimiter to worry about. Commented May 16, 2019 at 14:03
  • Only 4 chars special to sed? Square brackets break it too. Commented May 10, 2022 at 13:30
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    Yes. I can't remember why I did that. Possibly just to separate the "do this on every line" code from the "do this only on the last line" code. Commented Oct 25, 2022 at 18:28