help to delete brackets [ ]

kamel.seg · #1 (**permalink**) 01-18-2008

hi all,

i want to delete brackets in all the file and to keep the string or data between them ( example Q[xxxx] --> Qxxx) with sed command..

thanks

Tytalus · #2 (**permalink**) 01-18-2008

You could try tr:
e.g.

Code:

 echo "Q[xxxx]" | tr -d "[]"

or

Code:

echo "Q[xxxx]" < file

bakunin · #3 (**permalink**) 01-18-2008

The brackets can be removed like any other character but have to be escaped because they have a special meaning to sed: "\[" will tell sed to treat the left bracket just as that character and with now special meaning at all. (Btw. the same is true for any other character with a special meaning, or "metacharacter" as is the correct denomination of these characters, too. "\*" will be an asterisk and not the wildcard, etc.).

Therefore your sed script is

Code:

sed 's/\[//g;s/\]//g' /path/to/file

It is possible to write that even shorter: you can use the bracket-construction itself, observe, that inside brackets metacharacters lose their meanings automatically so you don't even have to escape them:

Code:

sed 's/[[]]//g' /path/to/file

bakunin

kamel.seg · #4 (**permalink**) 01-18-2008

thanks but
i need a command for all the file cause a have many cases like Q[xxx]...

shamrock · #5 (**permalink**) 01-18-2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by kamel.seg

hi all,

i want to delete brackets in all the file and to keep the string or data between them ( example Q[xxxx] --> Qxxx) with sed command..

thanks

Code:

for i in $(ls /path/to/files*)
do
    sed 's/\[//;s/\]//' $i
done

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