Sed for windows

I am attempting to use SED for the first time. To complicate matters, i am using it in windows. I downloaded from this source. Since I don't have install privileges on my work machine I created a folder in my profile for executables and added it to my PATH .

I am having issues try to use SED for the first time. It keeps failing with the error:

sed: -e expression #1, char 1: unknown command: ``''` I have tried a few different samples from This how to but I just can't get it. I found none else is having this problem. What should I try? I have tried encapsulating it in quotes, double quotes and back-quotes. Nothing seems to help.

TheSavo

Posted 2012-02-15T15:25:02.823

Reputation: 364

What exactly are you running? – johnny – 2012-02-15T16:08:08.370

I would highly recommend cygwin, the windows shell is such a PITA for unix-like commands. However, if you are planning on sticking with the windows shell, the easiest way ive found to run sed or awk is by creating a script file and then calling the file with the -f flag. For example sed -f some_sed_script.sed or awk -f some_awk_script.awk – SiegeX – 2012-02-15T17:10:46.270

Can you paste exactly what you're giving to the windows shell? – Rob – 2012-02-15T17:17:45.207

I thought I did include my input. I wish i did, because now it works after I tried @RedGrittyBrick gave – TheSavo – 2012-02-15T18:09:19.390

Answers

C:\>sed sdf
sed: -e expression #1, char 3: Unterminated `s' command

C:\>echo aaa > f
C:\>sed -e "s/a/x/" < f
xaa

This is using sed from unxutils

RedGrittyBrick

Posted 2012-02-15T15:25:02.823

Reputation: 70 632

This worked!. thank you. Is is that because the -e parameter ? – TheSavo – 2012-02-15T18:00:46.513

Not sure what was wrong, removing the -e parameter and the double " quotes, it still works – TheSavo – 2012-02-15T18:10:35.427

Unlike the Unixes, the Windows command-line shell does not perform any word-splitting and does not strip away the quotes; the program just receives a single string containing the entire command line. This means that not all programs can follow the same quoting rules.

In this case, the GnuWin32 version of sed only supports one quoting style – " double quotes ". For example, in my tests the following works fine:

sed "s/foo/bar/"

You can also get sed from Cygwin, along with a more-complete Unix-like system: shells, editors, other tools. It will be easier if you use a Unix shell for learning, to avoid such syntax issues in the future.

user1686

Posted 2012-02-15T15:25:02.823

Reputation: 283 655

beat my cygwin comment by seconds... :) – Rich Homolka – 2012-02-15T15:40:51.313

thanks. Does CygWin offer a non install? I tried with " double quotes and still no joy. – TheSavo – 2012-02-15T16:05:17.143

@TheSavo just delete the directory. there are some registry entries related to cygwin mounts, but these can be safely ignored, only cygwin reads them – Rich Homolka – 2012-02-28T06:56:30.517