ed(1) User Commands ed(1)NAME
ed, red - text editor
SYNOPSIS
/usr/bin/ed [-s | -] [-p string] [-x] [-C] [file]
/usr/xpg4/bin/ed [-s | -] [-p string] [-x] [-C] [file]
/usr/xpg6/bin/ed [-s | -] [-p string] [-x] [-C] [file]
/usr/bin/red [-s | -] [-p string] [-x] [-C] [file]
DESCRIPTION
The ed utility is the standard text editor. If file is specified, ed
simulates an e command (see below) on the named file. That is, the file
is read into ed's buffer so that it can be edited.
The ed utility operates on a copy of the file it is editing. Changes
made to the copy have no effect on the file until a w (write) command
is given. The copy of the text being edited resides in a temporary file
called the buffer. There is only one buffer.
The red utility is a restricted version of ed. It will only allow edit‐
ing of files in the current directory. red prohibits executing shell
commands via !shell command. Attempts to bypass these restrictions
result in an error message (restricted shell).
Both ed and red support the fspec(4) formatting capability. The default
terminal mode is either stty -tabs or stty tab3, where tab stops are
set at eight columns (see stty(1)). If, however, the first line of file
contains a format specification, that specification will override the
default mode. For example, tab stops would be set at 5, 10, and 15, and
a maximum line length of 72 would be imposed if the first line of file
contains
<:t5,10,15 s72:>
Commands to ed have a simple and regular structure: zero, one, or two
addresses followed by a single-character command, possibly followed by
parameters to that command. These addresses specify one or more lines
in the buffer. Every command that requires addresses has default
addresses, so that the addresses can very often be omitted.
In general, only one command may appear on a line. Certain commands
allow the input of text. This text is placed in the appropriate place
in the buffer. While ed is accepting text, it is said to be in input
mode. In this mode, no commands are recognized; all input is merely
collected. Leave input mode by typing a period (.) at the beginning of
a line, followed immediately by a carriage return.
/usr/bin/ed
If ed executes commands with arguments, it uses the default shell
/usr/bin/sh (see sh(1)).
/usr/xpg4/bin/ed and /usr/xpg6/bin/ed
If ed executes commands with arguments, it uses /usr/xpg4/bin/sh (see
ksh(1)).
Regular Expressions
The ed utility supports a limited form of regular expression notation.
Regular expressions are used in addresses to specify lines and in some
commands (for example, s) to specify portions of a line that are to be
substituted. To understand addressing in ed, it is necessary to know
that at any time there is a current line. Generally speaking, the cur‐
rent line is the last line affected by a command. The exact effect on
the current line is discussed under the description of each command.
Internationalized Basic Regular Expressions are used for all system-
supplied locales. See regex(5).
ed Commands
Commands may require zero, one, or two addresses. Commands that require
no addresses regard the presence of an address as an error. Commands
that accept one or two addresses assume default addresses when an
insufficient number of addresses is given; if more addresses are given
than such a command requires, the last one(s) are used.
Typically, addresses are separated from each other by a comma (,). They
may also be separated by a semicolon (;). In the latter case, the first
address is calculated, the current line (.) is set to that value, and
then the second address is calculated. This feature can be used to
determine the starting line for forward and backward searches (see
Rules 5 and 6, above). The second address of any two-address sequence
must correspond to a line in the buffer that follows the line corre‐
sponding to the first address.
For /usr/xpg6/gbin/ed, the address can be omitted on either side of the
comma or semicolon separator, in which case the resulting address pairs
are as follows:
┌─────────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────────┐
│ Specified │ Resulting │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│, │1 , $ │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│, addr │1 , addr │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│addr , │addr , addr │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│; │1 ; $ │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│; addr │1 ; addr │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│addr ; │addr ; addr │
└─────────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────┘
Any <blank>s included between addresses, address separators, or address
offsets are ignored.
In the following list of ed commands, the parentheses shown prior to
the command are not part of the address. Rather, the parentheses show
the default address(es) for the command.
Each address component can be preceded by zero or more blank charac‐
ters. The command letter can be preceded by zero or more blank charac‐
ters. If a suffix letter (l, n, or p) is given, it must immediately
follow the command.
The e, E, f, r, and w commands take an optional file parameter, sepa‐
rated from the command letter by one or more blank characters.
If changes have been made in the buffer since the last w command that
wrote the entire buffer, ed warns the user if an attempt is made to
destroy the editor buffer via the e or q commands. The ed utility
writes the string:
"?\n"
(followed by an explanatory message if help mode has been enabled via
the H command) to standard output and continues in command mode with
the current line number unchanged. If the e or q command is repeated
with no intervening command, ed takes effect.
If an end-of-file is detected on standard input when a command is
expected, the ed utility acts as if a q command had been entered.
It is generally illegal for more than one command to appear on a line.
However, any command (except e, f, r, or w) may be suffixed by l, n, or
p in which case the current line is either listed, numbered or written,
respectively, as discussed below under the l, n, and p commands.
(.)a The append command accepts zero or more lines of text and
<text> appends it after the addressed line in the buffer. The cur‐
. rent line (.) is left at the last inserted line, or, if
there were none, at the addressed line. Address 0 is legal
for this command: it causes the ``appended'' text to be
placed at the beginning of the buffer. The maximum number of
characters that may be entered from a terminal is 256 per
line (including the new-line character).
(.,.)c The change command deletes the addressed lines from the buf‐
<text> fer, then accepts zero or more lines of text that replaces
. these lines in the buffer. The current line (.) is left at
the last line input, or, if there were none, at the first
line that was not deleted. If the lines deleted were origi‐
nally at the end of the buffer, the current line number will
be set to the address of the new last line. If no lines
remain in the buffer, the current line number will be set to
0.
/usr/xpg4/bin/ed Address 0 is not legal for this command.
/usr/xpg6/bin/ed Address 0 is valid for this command. It
is interpreted as if the address 1 were
specified.
C Same as the X command, described later, except that ed
assumes all text read in for the e and r commands is
encrypted unless a null key is typed in.
(.,.)d The delete command deletes the addressed lines from the buf‐
fer. The line after the last line deleted becomes the cur‐
rent line. If the lines deleted were originally at the end
of the buffer, the new last line becomes the current line.
If no lines remain in the buffer, the current line number
will be set to 0.
e file The edit command deletes the entire contents of the buffer
and then reads the contents of file into the buffer. The
current line (.) is set to the last line of the buffer. If
file is not given, the currently remembered file name, if
any, is used (see the f command). The number of bytes read
will be written to standard output, unless the -s option was
specified, in the following format:
"%d\n" <number of bytes read>
file is remembered for possible use as a default file name
in subsequent e, E, r, and w commands. If file is replaced
by !, the rest of the line is taken to be a shell ( sh(1))
command whose output is to be read. Such a shell command is
not remembered as the current file name. See also DIAGNOS‐
TICS below. All marks are discarded upon the completion of a
successful e command. If the buffer has changed since the
last time the entire buffer was written, the user is warned,
as described previously.
E file The Edit command is like e, except that the editor does not
check to see if any changes have been made to the buffer
since the last w command.
f file If file is given, the f command changes the currently remem‐
bered path name to file. Whether the name is changed or not,
the f command then writes the (possibly new) currently
remembered path name to the standard output in the following
format:
"%s\n"pathname
The current line number is unchanged.
(1,$)g/RE/command list In the global command, the first step is to
mark every line that matches the given RE.
Then, for every such line, the given command
list is executed with the current line (.)
initially set to that line. When the g com‐
mand completes, the current line number has
the value assigned by the last command in the
command list. If there were no matching
lines, the current line number is not
changed. A single command or the first of a
list of commands appears on the same line as
the global command. All lines of a multi-line
list except the last line must be ended with
a backslash (\); a, i, and c commands and
associated input are permitted. The . termi‐
nating input mode may be omitted if it would
be the last line of the command list. An
empty command list is equivalent to the p
command. The g, G, v, V, and ! commands are
not permitted in the command list. See also
the NOTES and the last paragraph before FILES
below. Any character other than space or new‐
line can be used instead of a slash to
delimit the RE. Within the RE, the RE delim‐
iter itself can be used as a literal charac‐
ter if it is preceded by a backslash.
(1,$)G/RE/ In the interactive Global command, the first
step is to mark every line that matches the
given RE. Then, for every such line, that
line is written to standard output, the cur‐
rent line (.) is changed to that line, and
any one command (other than one of the a, c,
i, g, G, v, and V commands) may be input and
is executed. After the execution of that com‐
mand, the next marked line is written, and so
on. A new-line acts as a null command. An &
causes the re-execution of the most recent
non-null command executed within the current
invocation of G. Note: The commands input as
part of the execution of the G command may
address and affect any lines in the buffer.
The final value of the current line number is
the value set by the last command success‐
fully executed. (Notice that the last command
successfully executed is the G command itself
if a command fails or the null command is
specified.) If there were no matching lines,
the current line number is not changed. The G
command can be terminated by a SIGINT signal.
The G command can be terminated by an inter‐
rupt signal (ASCII DEL or BREAK). Any charac‐
ter other than space or newline can be used
instead of a slash to delimit the RE. Within
the RE, the RE delimiter itself can be used
as a literal character if it is preceded by a
backslash.
h The help command gives a short error message
that explains the reason for the most recent
? diagnostic. The current line number is
unchanged.
H The Help command causes ed to enter a mode in
which error messages are written for all sub‐
sequent ? diagnostics. It also explains the
previous ? if there was one. The H command
alternately turns this mode on and off; it is
initially off. The current line number is
unchanged.
(.,.)i The insert command accepts zero or more lines
<text> of text and inserts it before the addressed
. line in the buffer. The current line (.) is
left at the last inserted line, or, if there
were none, at the addressed line. This com‐
mand differs from the a command only in the
placement of the input text. The maximum num‐
ber of characters that may be entered from a
terminal is 256 per line (including the new-
line character).
/usr/xpg4/bin/ed Address 0 is not legal
for this command.
/usr/xpg6/bin/ed Address 0 is valid for
this command. It is
interpreted as if the
address 1 were specified.
(.,.+1)j The join command joins contiguous lines by
removing the appropriate new-line characters.
If exactly one address is given, this command
does nothing. If lines are joined, the cur‐
rent line number is set to the address of the
joined line. Otherwise, the current line num‐
ber is unchanged.
(.)kx The mark command marks the addressed line
with name x, which must be an ASCII lower-
case letter (a-z). The address a´x then
addresses this line. The current line (.) is
unchanged.
(.,.)l The l command writes to standard output the
addressed lines in a visually unambiguous
form. The characters ( \\, \a, \b, \f, \r,
\t, \v) are written as the corresponding
escape sequence. The \n in that table is not
applicable. Non-printable characters not in
the table are written as one three-digit
octal number (with a preceding backslash
character) for each byte in the character,
with the most significant byte first.
Long lines are folded, with the point of
folding indicated by writing backslash/new‐
line character. The length at which folding
occurs is unspecified, but should be appro‐
priate for the output device. The end of each
line is marked with a $. When using the
/usr/xpg6/bin/ed command, the end of each
line is marked with a $ due to folding, and $
characters within the text are written with a
preceding backslash. An l command can be
appended to any other command other than e,
E, f, q, Q, r, w, or !. The current line num‐
ber is set to the address of the last line
written.
(.,.)ma The move command repositions the addressed
line(s) after the line addressed by a.
Address 0 is legal for a and causes the
addressed line(s) to be moved to the begin‐
ning of the file. It is an error if address a
falls within the range of moved lines. The
current line (.) is left at the last line
moved.
(.,.)n The number command writes the addressed
lines, preceding each line by its line number
and a tab character. The current line (.) is
left at the last line written. The n command
may be appended to any command other than e,
E, f, q, Q, r, w, or !.
(.,.)p The print command writes the addressed lines
to standard output. The current line (.) is
left at the last line written. The p command
may be appended to any command other than e,
E, f, q, Q, r, w, or !. For example, dp
deletes the current line and writes the new
current line.
P The P command causes ed to prompt with an
asterisk (*) (or string, if -p is specified)
for all subsequent commands. The P command
alternatively turns this mode on and off; it
is initially on if the -p option is speci‐
fied, otherwise off. The current line is
unchanged.
q The quit command causes ed to exit. If the
buffer has changed since the last time the
entire buffer was written, the user is
warned. See DIAGNOSTICS.
Q The editor exits without checking if changes
have been made in the buffer since the last w
command.
($)r file The read command reads the contents of file
into the buffer. If file is not given, the
currently remembered file name, if any, is
used (see the e and f commands). The cur‐
rently remembered file name is not changed
unless file is the very first file name men‐
tioned since ed was invoked. Address 0 is
legal for r and causes the file to be read in
at the beginning of the buffer. If the read
is successful and the -s option was not spec‐
ified, the number of characters read is writ‐
ten to standard output in the following for‐
mat:
%d\n, <number of bytes read>
The current line (.) is set to the last line
read. If file is replaced by !, the rest of
the line is taken to be a shell command (see
sh(1)) whose output is to be read. For exam‐
ple, $r !ls appends the current directory to
the end of the file being edited. Such a
shell command is not remembered as the cur‐
rent file name.
(.,.)s/RE/replacement/
(.,.)s/RE/replacement/count, count=[1-2047]
(.,.)s/RE/replacement/g
(.,.)s/RE/replacement/l
(.,.)s/RE/replacement/n
(.,.)s/RE/replacement/p
The substitute command searches each addressed line for an occur‐
rence of the specified RE. Zero or more substitution commands can
be specified. In each line in which a match is found, all (non-
overlapped) matched strings are replaced by the replacement if the
global replacement indicator g appears after the command. If the
global indicator does not appear, only the first occurrence of the
matched string is replaced. If a number count appears after the
command, only the count-th occurrence of the matched string on each
addressed line is replaced. It is an error if the substitution
fails on all addressed lines. Any character other than space or
new-line may be used instead of the slash (/) to delimit the RE and
the replacement. The current line (.) is left at the last line on
which a substitution occurred. Within the RE, the RE delimiter
itself can be used as a literal character if it is preceded by a
backslash. See also the last paragraph before FILES below.
An ampersand (&) appearing in the replacement is replaced by the
string matching the RE on the current line. The special meaning of
& in this context may be suppressed by preceding it by \. As a more
general feature, the characters \n, where n is a digit, are
replaced by the text matched by the n-th regular subexpression of
the specified RE enclosed between \( and \). When nested parenthe‐
sized subexpressions are present, n is determined by counting
occurrences of \( starting from the left. When the character % is
the only character in the replacement, the replacement used in the
most recent substitute command is used as the replacement in the
current substitute command. If there was no previous substitute
command, the use of % in this manner is an error. The % loses its
special meaning when it is in a replacement string of more than one
character or is preceded by a \. For each backslash (\) encountered
in scanning replacement from beginning to end, the following char‐
acter loses its special meaning (if any). It is unspecified what
special meaning is given to any character other than &, \, %, or
digits.
A line may be split by substituting a new-line character into it.
The new-line in the replacement must be escaped by preceding it by
\. Such substitution cannot be done as part of a g or v command
list. The current line number is set to the address of the last
line on which a substitution is performed. If no substitution is
performed, the current line number is unchanged. If a line is
split, a substitution is considered to have been performed on each
of the new lines for the purpose of determining the new current
line number. A substitution is considered to have been performed
even if the replacement string is identical to the string that it
replaces.
The substitute command supports the following indicators:
count Substitute for the countth occurrence only of the RE found
on each addressed line. count must be between 1-2047.
g Globally substitute for all non-overlapping instances of
the RE rather than just the first one. If both g and count
are specified, the results are unspecified.
l Write to standard output the final line in which a substi‐
tution was made. The line is written in the format speci‐
fied for the l command.
n Write to standard output the final line in which a substi‐
tution was made. The line is written in the format speci‐
fied for the n command.
p Write to standard output the final line in which a substi‐
tution was made. The line will be written in the format
specified for the p command.
(.,.)ta
This command acts just like the m command, except that a copy of
the addressed lines is placed after address a (which may be 0). The
current line (.) is left at the last line copied.
u
The undo command nullifies the effect of the most recent command
that modified anything in the buffer, namely the most recent a, c,
d, g, i, j, m, r, s, t, u, v, G, or V command. All changes made to
the buffer by a g, G, v, or V global command is undone as a single
change.If no changes were made by the global command (such as with
g/ RE/p), the u command has no effect. The current line number is
set to the value it had immediately before the command being
undone started.
(1,$)v/RE/command list
This command is the same as the global command g, except that the
lines marked during the first step are those that do not match the
RE.
(1,$)V/RE/
This command is the same as the interactive global command G,
except that the lines that are marked during the first step are
those that do not match the RE.
(1,$)w file
The write command writes the addressed lines into file. If file
does not exist, it is created with mode 666 (readable and writable
by everyone), unless your file creation mask dictates otherwise.
See the description of the umask special command on sh(1). The cur‐
rently remembered file name is not changed unless file is the very
first file name mentioned since ed was invoked. If no file name is
given, the currently remembered file name, if any, is used (see the
e and f commands). The current line (.) is unchanged. If the com‐
mand is successful, the number of characters written is printed,
unless the -s option is specified in the following format:
"%d\n",<number of bytes written>
If file is replaced by !, the rest of the line is taken to be a
shell (see sh(1)) command whose standard input is the addressed
lines. Such a shell command is not remembered as the current path
name. This usage of the write command with ! is to be considered as
a ``last w command that wrote the entire buffer''.
(1,$)W file This command is the same as the write command above,
except that it appends the addressed lines to the
end of file if it exists. If file does not exist, it
is created as described above for the w command.
X An educated guess is made to determine whether text
read for the e and r commands is encrypted. A null
key turns off encryption. Subsequent e, r, and w
commands will use this key to encrypt or decrypt the
text. An explicitly empty key turns off encryption.
Also, see the -x option of ed.
($)= The line number of the addressed line is written to
standard output in the following format:
"%d\n"<line number>
The current line number is unchanged by this com‐
mand.
!shell command The remainder of the line after the ! is sent to the
UNIX system shell (see sh(1)) to be interpreted as a
command. Within the text of that command, the
unescaped character % is replaced with the remem‐
bered file name. If a ! appears as the first charac‐
ter of the shell command, it is replaced with the
text of the previous shell command. Thus, !! repeats
the last shell command. If any replacements of % or
! are performed, the modified line is written to the
standard output before command is executed. The !
command will write:
"!\n"
to standard output upon completion, unless the -s
option is specified. The current line number is
unchanged.
(.+1)<new-line> An address alone on a line causes the addressed line
to be written. A new-line alone is equivalent to
.+1p. It is useful for stepping forward through the
buffer. The current line number will be set to the
address of the written line.
If an interrupt signal (ASCII DEL or BREAK) is sent, ed writes a "?\n"
and returns to its command level.
The ed utility takes the standard action for all signals with the fol‐
lowing exceptions:
SIGINT The ed utility interrupts its current activity, writes the
string "?\n" to standard output, and returns to command mode.
SIGHUP If the buffer is not empty and has changed since the last
write, the ed utility attempts to write a copy of the buffer
in a file. First, the file named ed.hup in the current direc‐
tory is used. If that fails, the file named ed.hup in the
directory named by the HOME environment variable is used. In
any case, the ed utility exits without returning to command
mode.
Some size limitations are in effect: 512 characters in a line, 256
characters in a global command list, and 255 characters in the path
name of a file (counting slashes). The limit on the number of lines
depends on the amount of user memory. Each line takes 1 word.
When reading a file, ed discards ASCII and NUL characters.
If a file is not terminated by a new-line character, ed adds one and
puts out a message explaining what it did.
If the closing delimiter of an RE or of a replacement string (for exam‐
ple, /) would be the last character before a new-line, that delimiter
may be omitted, in which case the addressed line is written. The fol‐
lowing pairs of commands are equivalent:
s/s1/s2 s/s1/s2/p
g/s1 g/s1/p
?s1 ?s1?
If an invalid command is entered, ed writes the string:
"?\n"
(followed by an explanatory message if help mode has been enabled by
the H command) to standard output and continues in command mode with
the current line number unchanged.
OPTIONS-C Encryption option. The same as the -x option, except that
ed simulates a C command. The C command is like the X com‐
mand, except that all text read in is assumed to have been
encrypted.
-pstring Allows the user to specify a prompt string. By default,
there is no prompt string.
-s | -; Suppresses the writing of character counts by e, r, and w
commands, of diagnostics from e and q commands, and of the
! prompt after a !shell command.
-x Encryption option. When -x is used, ed simulates an X com‐
mand and prompts the user for a key. The X command makes
an educated guess to determine whether text read in is
encrypted or not. The temporary buffer file is encrypted
also, using a transformed version of the key typed in for
the -x option. See NOTES.
OPERANDS
The following operand is supported:
file If file is specified, ed simulates an e command on the file
named by the path name file before accepting commands from the
standard input.
USAGE
See largefile(5) for the description of the behavior of ed and red when
encountering files greater than or equal to 2 Gbyte ( 2^31 bytes).
ENVIRONMENT VARIABLES
See environ(5) for descriptions of the following environment variables
that affect the execution of ed: HOME, LANG, LC_ALL, LC_CTYPE, LC_COL‐
LATE, LC_MESSAGES, and NLSPATH.
EXIT STATUS
The following exit values are returned:
0 Successful completion without any file or command errors.
>0 An error occurred.
FILES
$TMPDIR If this environment variable is not NULL, its value is used
in place of /var/tmp as the directory name for the tempo‐
rary work file.
/var/tmp If /var/tmp exists, it is used as the directory name for
the temporary work file.
/tmp If the environment variable TMPDIR does not exist or is
NULL, and if /var/tmp does not exist, then /tmp is used as
the directory name for the temporary work file.
ed.hup Work is saved here if the terminal is hung up.
ATTRIBUTES
See attributes(5) for descriptions of the following attributes:
/usr/bin/ed, /usr/bin/red
┌─────────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────────┐
│ ATTRIBUTE TYPE │ ATTRIBUTE VALUE │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│Availability │SUNWcs │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│CSI │Enabled │
└─────────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────┘
/usr/xpg4/bin/ed
┌─────────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────────┐
│ ATTRIBUTE TYPE │ ATTRIBUTE VALUE │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│Availability │SUNWxcu4 │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│CSI │Enabled │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│Interface Stability │Committed │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│Standard │See standards(5). │
└─────────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────┘
/usr/xpg6/bin/ed
┌─────────────────────────────┬─────────────────────────────┐
│ ATTRIBUTE TYPE │ ATTRIBUTE VALUE │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│Availability │SUNWxcu6 │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│CSI │Enabled │
├─────────────────────────────┼─────────────────────────────┤
│Interface Stability │Standard │
└─────────────────────────────┴─────────────────────────────┘
SEE ALSObfs(1), edit(1), ex(1), grep(1), ksh(1), sed(1), sh(1), stty(1),
umask(1), vi(1), fspec(4), attributes(5), environ(5), largefile(5),
regex(5), standards(5)DIAGNOSTICS
? for command errors.
?file for an inaccessible file. Use the help and Help commands for
detailed explanations.
If changes have been made in the buffer since the last w command that
wrote the entire buffer, ed warns the user if an attempt is made to
destroy ed's buffer via the e or q commands. It writes ? and allows one
to continue editing. A second e or q command at this point will take
effect. The -s command-line option inhibits this feature.
NOTES
The - option, although it continues to be supported, has been replaced
in the documentation by the -s option that follows the Command Syntax
Standard (see Intro(1)).
A ! command cannot be subject to a g or a v command.
The ! command and the ! escape from the e, r, and w commands cannot be
used if the editor is invoked from a restricted shell (see sh(1)).
The sequence \n in an RE does not match a new-line character.
If the editor input is coming from a command file (for example, ed file
< ed_cmd_file), the editor exits at the first failure.
Loading an alternate malloc() library using the environment variable
LD_PRELOAD can cause problems for /usr/bin/ed.
SunOS 5.11 10 Dec 2003 ed(1)
