Insert multiple lines of text before specific line using Bash

Question

I am trying to insert a few lines of text before a specific line, but keep getting sed errors when I try to add a new line character. My command looks like:

sed -r -i '/Line to insert after/ i Line one to insert \\
    second new line to insert \\
    third new line to insert' /etc/directory/somefile.txt

The error that is reported is:

sed: -e expression #1, char 77: unterminated `s' command

I've tried, using \n, \\ (as in the example), no character at all, just moving the second line to the next line. I've also tried something like:

sed -r -i -e '/Line to insert after/ i Line one to insert'
    -e 'second new line to insert'
    -e 'third new line to insert' /etc/directory/somefile.txt

EDIT!: Apologies, I wanted the text inserted BEFORE the existing, not after!

score 13 · Accepted Answer · answered Aug 14 '15 at 10:00

13

This should work:

sed -i '/Line to insert after/ i Line one to insert \
second new line to insert \
third new line to insert' file

answered Aug 14 '15 at 10:00

anubhava

713,503
59
514
593

1

Probably want to use `a` if you are inserting after – 123 Aug 14 '15 at 10:17
1

Superb guide. Thanks a lot @anubhava – Chaminda Bandara May 16 '17 at 12:33
Is there any way we can insert multiple lines written in a seperate file into our file? A suggestion like [this](https://stackoverflow.com/a/22497499/4428377) . – aquaman Mar 10 '18 at 06:14

score 8 · Answer 2 · answered Aug 14 '15 at 16:30

For anything other than simple substitutions on individual lines, use awk instead of sed for simplicity, clarity, robustness, etc., etc.

To insert before a line:

awk '
/Line to insert before/ {
    print "Line one to insert"
    print "second new line to insert"
    print "third new line to insert"
}
{ print }
' /etc/directory/somefile.txt

To insert after a line:

awk '
{ print }
/Line to insert after/ {
    print "Line one to insert"
    print "second new line to insert"
    print "third new line to insert"
}
' /etc/directory/somefile.txt

score 2 · Answer 3 · answered May 28 '19 at 23:05

On MacOs I needed a few more things.

Double backslash after the i
Empty quotes after the -i to specify no backup file
Leading backslashes to add leading whitespace
Trailing double backslashes to add newlines

This code searches for the first instance of </plugins in pom.xml and inserts another XML object immediately preceding it, separated by a newline character.

sed -i '' "/\<\/plugins/ i \\
\            <plugin>\\
\                <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>\\
\                <artifactId>maven-source-plugin</artifactId>\\
\                <executions>\\
\                    <execution>\\
\                        <id>attach-sources</id>\\
\                        <goals>\\
\                            <goal>jar</goal>\\
\                        </goals>\\
\                    </execution>\\
\                </executions>\\
\            </plugin>\\
" pom.xml

Love this concise answer. Thanks. – kakyo Jul 14 '20 at 09:25 — kakyo, Jul 14 '20 at 09:25

vishnu raja · Answer 4 · 2017-09-22T07:49:27.810

1

This ll works from the first line.. For eg: If you want to insert from 3rd line of a file, replace "1i" to "3i".

sed -i '1i line1'\\n'line2'\\n'line3' 1.txt 

cat 1.txt

 line1
 line2
 line3
 Hai

edited Sep 22 '17 at 07:49

answered Sep 22 '17 at 07:40

vishnu raja

21
1
7

score 1 · Answer 5 · answered Jan 02 '19 at 22:29

When the lines to be inserted are the result of some command "mycmd" (like cat results.txt or printf "%s\n" line{1..3}), you can do

sed -i 's/Line to insert after/r' <(cmd) file
or 
sed -i 's/Line to insert after/echo "&";cmd/e' file

The last command can be simple modified when you want to insert before some match.

score 0 · Answer 6 · answered Aug 14 '15 at 10:01

0

sed -i '/Line to insert after/ i\
Line one to insert\
second new line to insert\
third new line to insert' /etc/directory/somefile.txt

answered Aug 14 '15 at 10:01

Mahesh Kharvi

389
2
6

Maybe you should explain what your change does. – drescherjm Aug 14 '15 at 14:20

score 0 · Answer 7 · answered Aug 14 '15 at 10:37

0

This might work for you (GNU sed & Bash):

sed -i $'/Line to insert after/a\line1\\nline2\\nline3' file

answered Aug 14 '15 at 10:37

potong

51,370
6
49
80

score 0 · Answer 8 · answered Mar 01 '18 at 15:01

0

To be POSIX compliant and run in OS X, I used the following (single quoted line and empty line are for demonstration purposes):

sed -i "" "/[pattern]/i\\
line 1\\
line 2\\
\'line 3 with single quotes\`
\\
" <filename>

answered Mar 01 '18 at 15:01

Andi

2,731
1
19
12

score 0 · Answer 9 · answered Jan 03 '19 at 14:18

This can be easily done with Perl also

$ cat MeanwhileInHell.txt
Iran|XXXXXX|Iranian
Iraq|YYYYYY|Iraquian
Saudi|ZZZZZ|Saudi is a Rich Country
USA|AAAAAA|USA is United States of America.
India|IIII|India got freedom from British.
Scot|SSSSS|Canada Mexio.
$ perl -pe 'BEGIN {$x="Line one to insert\nLine 2\nLine3\n"} $_=$x.$_ if /USA/ ' MeanwhileInHell.txt
Iran|XXXXXX|Iranian
Iraq|YYYYYY|Iraquian
Saudi|ZZZZZ|Saudi is a Rich Country
Line one to insert
Line 2
Line3
USA|AAAAAA|USA is United States of America.
India|IIII|India got freedom from British.
Scot|SSSSS|Canada Mexio.
$

Insert multiple lines of text before specific line using Bash

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