SED Command – How to Insert Text After the Last Line

sed

This sed command inserts a tag to the beginning of a file:

sed -i "1s/^/<?php /" file

How can I insert something to the end of each file with sed?

Best Answer

The simplest way is:

sed -i -e '$aTEXTTOEND' filename

How it works

$ matches the last line (it's a normal sed address; 4aTEXTTOEND would insert after the fourth line), a is the append command, and TEXTTOEND is what to append, filename is the file where the TEXTTOEND will be inserted

Related Solutions

Shell – sed insert in the beginning of multiple files is not working

To edit file in-place with OSX sed, you need to set empty extension:

$ sed -i '' '1i\
#encoding:utf-8' filename

And you need a literal newline after i\. This is specified by POSIX sed.

Only GNU sed allows text to be inserted on the same line with command.

sed can also works with multiple files at once, so you can use -exec command {} + form:

$ find . -iname "*.erb" -type f -exec sed -i '' '1i\
#encoding:utf-8' {} +

SED: insert something after the second last line

To insert a line before the last ($) one:

$ cat test
one
two
three
four
five

$ sed '$i<hello>!' test
one
two
three
four
<hello>!
five

That's for GNU sed (and beware leading spaces or tabs are stripped). Portably (or with GNU sed, if you want to preserve the leading spaces or tabs in the inserted line), you'd need:

sed '$i\
<hello>!' test

Best Answer

How it works

Related Solutions

Shell – sed insert in the beginning of multiple files is not working

SED: insert something after the second last line

Related Question