8.17. replace — A String-Replacement Utility
The replace utility program changes strings
in place in files or on the standard input.
Invoke replace in one of the following
ways:
shell> replace from to [from to] ... -- file [file] ...
shell> replace from to [from to] ... < input
from represents a string to look
for and to represents its
replacement. There can be one or more pairs of strings.
Use the -- option to indicate where the
string-replacement list ends and the filenames begin. In this
case, any file named on the command line is modified in place,
so you may want to make a copy of the original before
converting it. replace prints a
message indicating which of the input files it actually
modifies.
If the -- option is not given
replace reads the standard input and writes
to the standard output.
replace uses a finite state machine to
match longer strings first. It can be used to swap strings.
For example, the following command swaps a
and b in the given files,
file1 and file2:
shell> replace a b b a -- file1 file2 ...
The replace program is used by
msql2mysql. See
Section 25.9.1, “msql2mysql — Convert mSQL Programs for Use with MySQL”.
replace supports the following options:
-
-?, -I
Display a help message and exit.
-
-#
debug_options
Write a debugging log. The
debug_options'd:t:o,file_name'.
-
-s
Silent mode. Print less information what the program does.
-
-v
Verbose mode. Print more information about what the
program does.
-
-V
Display version information and exit.
