s

[

address1

][

,



address2

]

s/



pattern



/



replacement



/

[

flags

]

Substitute replacement for pattern on each addressed line. If pattern addresses are used, the pattern // represents the last pattern address specified. The following flags can be specified:

n

Replace n th instance of / pattern / on each addressed line. n is any number in the range 1 to 512; the default is 1.

g

Replace all instances of / pattern / on each addressed line, not just the first instance.

p

Print the line if a successful substitution is done. If several successful substitutions are done, multiple copies of the line will be printed.

w file

Write the line to a file if a replacement was done. A maximum of 10 different files can be opened.

Examples

Here are some short, commented scripts:

# Change third and fourth quote to ( and ): /function/{ s/"/(/3 s/"/)/4 } # Remove all quotes on a given line: /Title/s/"//g # Remove first colon or all quotes; print resulting lines: s/://p s/"//gp # Change first "if" but leave "ifdef" alone: /ifdef/!s/if/   if/