Using sed to replace specific character and specific position


 
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# 1  
Old 06-03-2009
Using sed to replace specific character and specific position

I am trying to use sed to replace specific characters at a specific position in the file with a different value... can this be done?

Example:

File:
A0199999123
A0199999124
A0199999125

Need to replace 99999 in positions 3-7 with 88888.

Any help is appreciated.
# 2  
Old 06-03-2009
Can you show us what you have tried so far?

Regards
# 3  
Old 06-03-2009
I have tried several variations of sed with no luck.

sed 's/...99999/88888/'

This was close except it replaced the first 8 characters with only 5.

-----Post Update-----

Nevermind, I got it.

sed 's/^\(.\{3\}\)99999/\188888/'

Replaces 99999 starting at position 3 with 88888
# 4  
Old 06-04-2009
Code:
 sed  's/\(.\{3\}\)\([0-9]\{5\}\)\(.*\)/\188888\3/g' filename



-Devaraj Takhellambam
# 5  
Old 10-11-2009
can sed do this beyond 255 chars ? for example, i want to replace at position 500.
# 6  
Old 10-11-2009
Hi.

Sed will read a line of any length, but the command block { } has a 32K -1 limit (32767) (this may be implementation-specific)

Code:
# sed "s/\(.\{32767\}\)...../\1 XXXXxxxX/" file1 > file2
# echo $?
# 0
 
# sed "s/\(.\{32768\}\)...../\1 XXXXxxxX/" file1 > file2
sed: -e expression #1, char 34: Invalid content of \{\}

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