[SOLVED] SED inplace file change inside make - How?

Issue

sed inplace change on a file is not working inside Make object.

I want to replace a line in a file with sed called in a make object. But it does not seem to be working. How can I fix this?

change_generics:
ifeq ($(run_TESTNAME), diagnostics)
    ifeq ($(run_TESTCASE), 1)
        sed -i -e "s/SIM_MULTI\==[a-z,A-Z]*/SIM_MULTI=TRUE/" ./generics.f
    else ifeq ($(TESTCASE), 2)
        sed -i -e "s/SIM_MISSED\==[a-z,A-Z]*/SIM_MISSED=TRUE/" ./generics.f
    endif
endif

I would like the generics.f file changed with that one line change. But it remains the same as the original. The sed command works outside make.

Solution

I can't reproduce this using GNU sed 4.2.2 and GNU make 3.82, or at least, I can't reproduce any scenario where the same sed command works from the command line but not in a Makefile.

Simpler Makefile:

all:
  # Contrived just so I can test your 2 sed commands.
  sed -i -e "s/SIM_MULTI\==[a-z,A-Z]*/SIM_MULTI=TRUE/" ./generics.f
  sed -i -e "s/SIM_MISSED\==[a-z,A-Z]*/SIM_MISSED=TRUE/" ./generics.f

Sample file content in generics.f:

SIM_MULTI=foo
SIM_MISSED=bar

Testing:

$ make all
sed -i -e "s/SIM_MULTI\==[a-z,A-Z]*/SIM_MULTI=TRUE/" ./generics.f
sed -i -e "s/SIM_MISSED\==[a-z,A-Z]*/SIM_MISSED=TRUE/" ./generics.f

Confirmed that both sed commands fail to edit a file with this content.

To fix:

Probably, you need to simply remove the \= from your regular expression. The backslash there has no effect, and causes your regex to simply match two equals signs ==. Thus this works:

all:
  sed -i 's/SIM_MULTI=[a-zA-Z]*/SIM_MULTI=TRUE/' ./generics.f
  sed -i 's/SIM_MISSED=[a-zA-Z]*/SIM_MISSED=TRUE/' ./generics.f

Testing:

$ make all
sed -i 's/SIM_MULTI=[a-zA-Z]*/SIM_MULTI=TRUE/' ./generics.f
sed -i 's/SIM_MISSED=[a-zA-Z]*/SIM_MISSED=TRUE/' ./generics.f
$ cat generics.f
SIM_MULTI=TRUE
SIM_MISSED=TRUE

Further explanation:

• There is no need to specify -e there.
• There is no need to enclose the script in double quotes, which is riskier because it allows the contents to be modified by the shell.
• The bug appears to be \= and I deleted those characters, as mentioned above.
• Note that I removed the comma , as well in [a-z,A-Z]. I think that probably isn't what you meant, and it would cause a class of characters including a-z, A-Z and a comma , to be matched by the regex. (And if it is what you mean, you might consider writing it as [a-zA-Z,] as that would be less confusing.)

If this has not resolved your issue, I would need to know things like:

• What is the version of your sed.
• What is the contents in generics.f.

Answered By - Alex Harvey