FIGURE 1: Simplified SED Syntax

SED Syntax

You can place one edit command on the command line: for example,
```
sed "command" <input.dat output.dat
```
You can place multiple edit commands on the command line: for example,
```
sed -e "command1" -e "command2" <input.dat >output.dat
```
You can use f to input a file that contains one or more commands: for example,
```
sed -f command.dat <input.dat >output.dat
```

Command Format

[address] function [arguments]

Address

The address is optional. If the address is omitted, SED selects all lines for the function.
If address is a number, SED selects that line number: for example,
```
10 function
```
You can use a comma to specify a range of line numbers: for example,
```
5,10 function
```
You can select lines that contain a particular string: for example,
```
/string/function
```

Address Strings That Specify Special Characters

Character	Specifies
^	Beginning of line
$	End of line
.	Wildcard, any character
.	Wildcard, any character
X+	One or more occurrence of X
X*	Zero or more occurrences of X
[]	A set of characters: For example, [Aa] accepts both upper- and lowercase A, [A-Z] accepts the range of A to Z, and [A-Za-z0-9] accepts the ranges of A to Z or a to z or 0 to 9.

Special characters require a preceding backslash (\) character for SED to treat them as literal characters. For example, if you want to use the ^ character as part of the pattern match, you must precede it with a backslash to override the ^ special meaning at the beginning of a line:

\\	=	\
\[	=	[
\]	=	]
\$	=	$
\^	=	^

Functions

Function	Specifies
a line	Add a line after each selected line.
c line	Change--Replaces each selected line with the specified line.
d	Delete each selected line.
i line	Insert a line before each selected line.
p	Print--Place the current line on stdout (duplicate current line).
q(omega)	Quit--Stop processing lines after processing the selected line.
r file	Read--Insert file contents after line.
s/string1/string2/	Substitute string1 with string2 in each selected line.
s/string1/string2/g	Globally substitute string1 with string2 in each selected line (all occurrences of \string1).