Thanks thats a nice neat solution. I like it.
Paul Tansom wrote:
> ** Keir Whitlock <keir.whitlock@???> [2007-12-20 09:01]:
>
>> Hi,
>> A quick one for you, echo "hi" >> /tmp/file will append hi to the
>> end of file, but how do I prepend it to the top of the file?
>>
> ** end quote [Keir Whitlock]
>
> How's about:
>
> sed -i.bak '1 s/^/Hi\n/' file.txt
>
> - the -i.bak works on the existing file and creates a backup with .bak
> added to the file name
> - the bit between the ' characters does the actual work
> o the 1 at the beginning limits the action to the first line
> o then there is the standard style substitution replacing the beginning
> (or rather inserting, since you can't exactly replace the beginning -
> it still has to start somewhere!) of the line (indicated by the ^)
> with Hi and a new line (the \n)
> - lastly the file.txt is the file name to work on
>
> I'm far from being an expert, but sed and awk are mighty powerful tools
> if you can get to grips with them, this is just scratching the surface
> of one of them!
>
>
