vi syntax to comment out non-commented lines (cron)

Question

Anyone know if it's possible in vi to replace only uncommented/non-blank lines with comments?

If I want to replace a commented line with something I know I can use :%s/^#/##foo##/g -- but I am looking for the opposite of this.

Example file:

# Some user's cron

# Test comments
00 00 * * * ~/somescript.sh

Expected result:

# Some user's cron

# Test comments
##DISABLE##00 00 * * * ~/somescript.sh

Randall · Answer 1 · 2009-10-07T16:45:15.447

3

:g/^[0-9\*]/s/^/##DISABLED##/

This "g/RE/" part selects all lines that begin with a number or the * character. The "s/RE/replacement/" then does the work on all selected lines.

edited Oct 07 '09 at 16:45

answered Oct 07 '09 at 16:37

Randall

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or `:g/^[^#]/s/^/##DISABLED##/` – wfaulk Oct 07 '09 at 16:47
Good call wfaulk. Even simpler. – Randall Oct 07 '09 at 16:53
You beat me to it by like 1 minute. – wfaulk Oct 07 '09 at 17:32

Paul Tomblin · Answer 2 · 2009-10-07T15:45:20.840

1

:%s/^\([^#]\)/##DISABLE##\1/

edited Oct 07 '09 at 15:45

answered Oct 07 '09 at 15:37

Paul Tomblin

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What is `@`? --padding-- – wfaulk Oct 07 '09 at 15:39
Sorry, that was meant to be a '%' – Paul Tomblin Oct 07 '09 at 15:45

wfaulk · Answer 3 · 2009-10-07T16:50:53.407

0

:map q /^[^#]<Enter>0i##DISABLE##<Esc>q
1Gq

This works in vim, but not in stock vi, which won't do tail recursion on mappings.

edited Oct 07 '09 at 16:50

answered Oct 07 '09 at 15:37

wfaulk

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Ali Mezgani · Answer 4 · 2009-10-07T15:53:09.077

0


sed -i -e 's/^\([^#]\)/#\1/g' /etc/cronfile

edited Oct 07 '09 at 15:53

answered Oct 07 '09 at 15:43

Ali Mezgani

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Kyle Brandt · Answer 5 · 2009-10-07T15:59:06.117

0

Maybe something like:

%s/^\([^#]\)\|!\($\)/##FOO##\1/g

I know its a mess with all those escapes, but the first part it the line does not start with # [^#], OR (The escaped pipe \| ) a line that is not empty ( ^$ )

edited Oct 07 '09 at 15:59

answered Oct 07 '09 at 15:46

Kyle Brandt

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You mean %s/^\$[^#]\$\|!\$$\$/##FOO##\1/g – Ali Mezgani Oct 07 '09 at 15:52
Doesn't work in standard vi. Would work without the `|` or: `:%s/^$[^#]$/##FOO##\1/g` – wfaulk Oct 07 '09 at 17:05

score 0 · Answer 6 · answered Oct 07 '09 at 15:56

0

:%s/^\([#\n]\)\@!/##DISABLE##/g

the ^([#\n])\@! means "not # or newline at beginning of line"

Works for me in vim 7.2

answered Oct 07 '09 at 15:56

Doesn't work in standard vi; no zero-width matches (`\@!`). – wfaulk Oct 07 '09 at 17:07

score 0 · Answer 7 · answered Oct 07 '09 at 16:56

0

If you're using Vim, you may be interested in the EnhCommentify.vim plugin which lets you easily toggle comments.

answered Oct 07 '09 at 16:56

Kamil Kisiel

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vi syntax to comment out non-commented lines (cron)

7 Answers7