Regex: Replace character between two strings (excluding the strings themselves) using sed

Question

I have a minor problem. I want to replace a character/single string between two strings but would like to leave the strings themselves "unharmed" by using sed.

The input is:

<hello> <world>

My desired output:

<hello>
<world>

My first attempt:

echo "<hello> <world>" | sed 's/>.</\n/g'

The output of it:

<hello
world>

As you can see, the ">" from "" and the "<" from "" have been removed by using my line above.

How do I prevent it from doing so?

This might help: echo "<hello> <world>" | sed -E 's/(\W) (\W)/\1\n\2/g' — Cyrus
– Cyrus, Commented Jun 17, 2018 at 20:25

suren · Accepted Answer · 2018-06-17 19:52:11Z

2

This one works too:

echo "<hello> <world>" | sed 's/>./>\n/g'

answered Jun 17, 2018 at 19:52

suren

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Comments

asaeles · Accepted Answer · 2018-06-17 18:39:14Z

1

Instead use:

echo "<hello> <world>" | sed 's/>.</>\n</g'

This is possible all the characters you are replacing are static.

answered Jun 17, 2018 at 18:39

asaeles

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1 Comment

asaeles Over a year ago

If not you can also do this by using zero-length assertions, but this depends on the version of sed you are using.

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