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From: skwu@boulder.Colorado.EDU (WU SHI-KUEI)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: Patching multiple files with same text
Message-ID: <19006@boulder.Colorado.EDU>
Date: 29 Mar 90 23:43:28 GMT
References: <193@rdb1.UUCP> <7592@jpl-devvax.JPL.NASA.GOV>
Sender: news@boulder.Colorado.EDU
Reply-To: skwu@boulder.Colorado.EDU (WU SHI-KUEI)
Organization: University of Colorado, Boulder
Lines: 14

'Ed' and a 'here' document will do what you need.  E.g:

for i in file1 file2 ......
do
ed $i << THE_END
g/RE_1/.,/RE_2/c\\
new text, with each new line escaped
w
.
THE_END
done

Where RE_1 (RE_2) matches the first (last) line of the text that must be
replaced.