From saunders@luther.che.wisc.edu (Brian E. Saunders)
Subject: vi insert question
Date: 28 May 92 16:20:16 GMT

Say I have 1000 lines of text.  Before each line, I want to insert a
specific character.  How do I do this with 1 command?

Note:  each line before the character is inserted does not begin with the
same character, so I can't do a simple substitution command.
-- 

Brian E. Saunders			saunders@luther.che.wisc.edu


From snk@fork.bae.bellcore.com (Samuel N Kamens)
Subject: Re: vi insert question
Date: 28 May 92 17:58:31 GMT
Reply-To: snk@bae.bellcore.com

In article <1992May28.112017.21007@doug.cae.wisc.edu>, saunders@luther.che.wisc.edu (Brian E. Saunders) writes:
> Say I have 1000 lines of text.  Before each line, I want to insert a
> specific character.  How do I do this with 1 command?
> 
> Note:  each line before the character is inserted does not begin with the
> same character, so I can't do a simple substitution command.
> -- 


Try this:


:1,$s/^/c/

This says:

     :1,$  (for every line in the file)
     s/^/c/  (replace the regular expression ^, which means 
	      "beginning of line", with the character c).

Sam

-- 
Sam Kamens					Bell Communications Research
snk@bae.bellcore.com				Phone: (908) 699-7509
444 Hoes Lane  Room RRC 1D-210
Piscataway, NJ 08854


From soh@andromeda.trl.OZ.AU (Kam Hung Soh)
Subject: Re: vi insert question
Date: Thu, 28 May 1992 22:02:42 GMT

snk@fork.bae.bellcore.com (Samuel N Kamens) writes:

>In article <1992May28.112017.21007@doug.cae.wisc.edu>, saunders@luther.che.wisc.edu (Brian E. Saunders) writes:
>> Say I have 1000 lines of text.  Before each line, I want to insert a
>> specific character.  How do I do this with 1 command?

>:1,$s/^/c/
>     :1,$  (for every line in the file)
>     s/^/c/  (replace the regular expression ^, which means 
>	      "beginning of line", with the character c).

``%'' is the abbreviation for ``1,$'' - the entire buffer.  I.e:

:%s/^/c/

This works for vi under SunOS and vim on the Amiga.  For more vi
discussion, read comp.editors.

Regards,


Soh, Kam Hung, Network Management Research,     |  h.soh@trl.oz.au  
TRL, POB 249 Clayton, Victoria 3168, Australia  |  +61 3 253 6638


From buck@pool.info.sunyit.edu (Jesse Buckley)
Subject: Re: vi insert question
Date: Thu, 28 May 1992 19:51:45 GMT

In article <1992May28.112017.21007@doug.cae.wisc.edu> saunders@luther.che.wisc.edu (Brian E. Saunders) writes:
>Say I have 1000 lines of text.  Before each line, I want to insert a
>specific character.  How do I do this with 1 command?
>
>Note:  each line before the character is inserted does not begin with the
>same character, so I can't do a simple substitution command.

Actually you can.  Try this...

:1,$ s/^/XXXX/

It works on my system.  (ULTRIX 4.2)

-- 
=) Buck (buck@sunyit.edu)
"I believe in getting into hot water; it keeps you clean."
  -- G. K. Chesterton


From esaffle@gmuvax2.gmu.edu (L. Ron Hoover)
Subject: Re: vi insert question
Date: 29 May 92 03:07:13 GMT

In article <1992May28.112017.21007@doug.cae.wisc.edu> saunders@luther.che.wisc.edu (Brian E. Saunders) writes:
>Say I have 1000 lines of text.  Before each line, I want to insert a
>specific character.  How do I do this with 1 command?
>
>Note:  each line before the character is inserted does not begin with the
>same character, so I can't do a simple substitution command.

if EVERY line has to have something inserted before it, meaning at the start
of every line, try this:

:g/^/s//what you want inserted/

type it as show, substituting in the text you want instead of "what you want
inserted", of course.

Ed


From agc@bnr.ca (Alan Carter)
Subject: Re: vi insert question
Date: Fri, 29 May 1992 09:40:48 GMT

In article <1992May28.112017.21007@doug.cae.wisc.edu>, saunders@luther.che.wisc.edu (Brian E. Saunders) writes:
|> Say I have 1000 lines of text.  Before each line, I want to insert a
|> specific character.  How do I do this with 1 command?
|> 
|> Note:  each line before the character is inserted does not begin with the
|> same character, so I can't do a simple substitution command