Appending to file, sed unterminated address regex

Question

I'm trying to append to the end of a file, using the style from this answer but I get the error:

sed: -e expression #1, char 16: unterminated address regex

the command (I've also tried without the -i and same error):

sed -i -e '\$ahaha_value=26' example.txt

where I'm expecting $ to get the end of the file and a to append.

I've looked at these questions here, here, and here. The issues there seem to be regex based and I don't see the issue with my regex.

any particular reason to use sed? why not simply use `echo 'haha_value=26' >> example.txt` ? — Sundeep, Oct 04 '16 at 16:21

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Oct 04 '16 at 16:06

2

With single quotes you don't need to escape $ sign since it's not going to be evaluated by shell.

Either

 sed -e '$a...'

or

sed -e "\$a..."

answered Oct 04 '16 at 16:06

karakfa

just fyi I found out you do need the `-i` to actually edit the file but your answers worked – depperm Oct 04 '16 at 16:10

score 0 · Answer 2 · answered Oct 04 '16 at 16:06

0

You can use this sed:

sed -i '' '$a\
haha_value=26
' example.txt

answered Oct 04 '16 at 16:06

anubhava

2 Answers2