https://community.hpe.com/t5/operating-system-hp-ux/sed-script-to-replace-string/m-p/2503237#M883444 Hi,<BR />Can someone solve a trivial puzzle that has been annoying me for a while.<BR />I just need to search/replace string1 (variable length) in "......... (INITIAL string1 string2 ........."<BR />I have:<BR />sed -e 's/\((INITIAL \)\(.* \)\(.*\)/\1newstring\3/' but cannot remember how to pattern match on "any no of chars except " " instead of .*<BR />Cheers<BR />Ian Fri, 09 Mar 2001 10:27:24 GMT Ian McClement 2001-03-09T10:27:24Z https://community.hpe.com/t5/operating-system-hp-ux/sed-script-to-replace-string/m-p/2503237#M883444 Hi,<BR />Can someone solve a trivial puzzle that has been annoying me for a while.<BR />I just need to search/replace string1 (variable length) in "......... (INITIAL string1 string2 ........."<BR />I have:<BR />sed -e 's/\((INITIAL \)\(.* \)\(.*\)/\1newstring\3/' but cannot remember how to pattern match on "any no of chars except " " instead of .*<BR />Cheers<BR />Ian Fri, 09 Mar 2001 10:27:24 GMT https://community.hpe.com/t5/operating-system-hp-ux/sed-script-to-replace-string/m-p/2503237#M883444 Ian McClement 2001-03-09T10:27:24Z https://community.hpe.com/t5/operating-system-hp-ux/sed-script-to-replace-string/m-p/2503238#M883445 [^ ]*<BR />The up arrow in in square backets means match everything except whats in the square brackets.<BR /><BR />Thus this will match any number of non-space characters.<BR /><BR /> Fri, 09 Mar 2001 15:30:38 GMT https://community.hpe.com/t5/operating-system-hp-ux/sed-script-to-replace-string/m-p/2503238#M883445 Rodney Hills 2001-03-09T15:30:38Z