xenial (1) rpl.1.gz

NAME

     rpl — replace strings in files

SYNOPSIS

     rpl [-LhiwbqvsRepfdt] [-xSUFFIX] ⟨old_string⟩ ⟨new_string⟩ ⟨target_file ...⟩

DESCRIPTION

     Basic usage is to specify two strings and one or more filenames or directories on the command line.  The
     first string is the string to replace, and the second string is the replacement string.

     -h, --help
             A short help text.

     -L, --license
             Show the license and exit.

     -xSUFFIX
             Search only files ending with SUFFIX, e.g.  “.txt”.  May be specified multiple times.

     -i, --ignore-case
             Ignore the case of old_string.

     -w, --whole-words
             Make old_string match only on word boundaries.

     -b, --backup
             Move the original files to filename~ before replacing them.

     -q, --quiet
             Quiet mode.

     -v, --verbose
             Verbose mode.

     -s, --dry-run
             Simulation mode, no files are changed.

     -R, --recursive
             Recurse into subdirectories.

     -e, --escape
             Expand escape sequences in old_string and new_string.  Examples of escape sequences are ‘\n’ (new-
             line), ‘\t’ (tab), ‘\x42’ (hexadecimal number 42), ‘\033’ (octal number 033).

     -p, --prompt
             Prompt for confirmation before replacing each file.

     -f, --force
             Ignore errors when trying to restore permissions and file ownership.

     -d, --keep-times
             Keep modification times when replacing files.

     -t, --use-tmpdir
             Use a temporary directory for storing temporary files, usually the value of the environment
             variable TMPDIR.  The default is to put temporary files in the same directory as the file being
             modified.

     -a, --all
             Do not ignore files and directories starting with .

IMPLEMENTATION NOTES

     An effort has been made to make the program behave as much as the original rpl as necessary.  Where it has
     been possible to make improvements, improvements have been made.  This implementation lacks many of the
     bugs in the original.

EXAMPLES

     Replace all occurences of “F” (on word boundaries) with “A” in all text files under the grades/ directory:
           $ rpl -Rwd -x'.txt' 'F' 'A' grades/

SEE ALSO

     find(1), sed(1).

HISTORY

     This program was written for Debian as a free replacement for the non-free rpl program by Joe Laffey.

AUTHORS

     Göran Weinholt <weinholt@debian.org>.