Find and replace part of a string using bash in an XML file

Question

I am new to bash scripting and was looking into what kid of command will help me replace a specific string in an xml file.

The string looks like

uri='file:/var/lib/abc/cde.repo/r/c/e/v/1.1/abc-1.1.jar'

Should be replaced with

uri='file:/lib/abc-1.1.jar'

The strings vary as the jars vary too. First part of the string "file:/var/lib/abc/cde.repo/r/" is constant and is across all strings. The 2nd half is varying

This needs to be done across entire file. Please note that replacing one is easier then doing it for each an every string that varies. I am trying to look for solution to do it in one single command.

I know we can use sed but how? Any pointers are highly appreciated

Thanks

hek2mgl · Accepted Answer · 2013-11-18 09:26:47Z

3

With sed:

sed "s~uri='file:/var/lib/abc/cde.repo/r/c/e/v/1\.1/abc-1.1.jar~uri='file:/lib/abc-1\.1\.jar'~g"

Basically it is:

sed "s~pattern~replacement~g"

where s is the command substitute and the trailing g means globally. I'm using ~ as the delimiter char as this helps to avoid escaping all that / in the paths. (thanks @Jotne)

Update: In order to make the regex more flexible, you may try this:

sed 's~file.*/\(.*\.jar\)\(.*\)~file:///lib/\1\2~' a.txt

It searches for file: ... .jar links, grabs the name of the jar file and builds the new links.

edited Nov 18, 2013 at 9:26

answered Nov 16, 2013 at 20:53

hek2mgl

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6 Comments

Masti Over a year ago

Thanks hek2mgl for the quick response! That was very quick. How can you do this repeatedly with first half of the string been static and second half keeps changing (as per question). I want to replace all strings in the file with similar format. 2nd string for example will look like uri='file:/var/lib/abc/cde.repo/t/e/s/t/v/1.9/zzz-1.9.jar' to be replace by 'uri='file:/lib/zzz-1.9.jar'

hwnd Over a year ago

Try the following sed -re "s~uri='file:\S+/(\S+)'$~uri='file:/lib/\1'~g" file

Jotne Over a year ago

@hek2mgl With nearly 23000 points here, you should know that sed can use different separator like this: sed "s~uri='file:/var/lib/abc/cde.repo/r/c/e/v/1\.1/abc-1.1.jar~uri='file:/lib/abc-1\.1\.jar~g" This way you do not need to escape all /

hek2mgl Over a year ago

@Masti I have to leave for today. If you have patience until tomorrow I can help.. I guess the community might being faster.. :)

hek2mgl Over a year ago

@Jotne I think text editing is a task for sed. Althought it is nicely possible with awk, sed should be used here. Or even xslt because regexes and html/xml aren't friends..... cu, and thanks for the ~ ... :)

|

Jotne · Accepted Answer · 2013-11-16 21:07:33Z

2

Using awk you can do:

awk -F/ '/file:\/var\/lib\/abc\/cde.repo\/r/ {print $1,$3,$NF}' OFS=/ file
uri='file:/lib/abc-1.1.jar'

Static URL, but changing file name.

edited Nov 16, 2013 at 21:07

answered Nov 16, 2013 at 21:02

Jotne

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Comments

cforbish · Accepted Answer · 2013-11-16 22:53:17Z

0

You do not need to use sed or even awk. You could simply use basename:

prefix='file:/lib/'
uri='file:/var/lib/abc/cde.repo/r/c/e/v/1.1/abc-1.1.jar'
result="${prefix}$(basename ${uri})"
echo ${result}

answered Nov 16, 2013 at 22:53

cforbish

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S.B · Accepted Answer · 2022-02-28 17:58:48Z

0

This worked for me :

sudo sed -i -e "s/stringToChange/TheNewString/g" test.xml

edited Feb 28, 2022 at 17:58

S.B

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answered Feb 28, 2022 at 17:46

HASSANI Hamza

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