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From: rostamia@umbc3.UMBC.EDU (Rouben Rostamian)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: Deleting (Only) First Blank Line in File
Message-ID: <3544@umbc3.UMBC.EDU>
Date: 30 Jun 90 14:20:09 GMT
References: <1651@fallst.UUCP>
Reply-To: rostamia@umbc3.umbc.edu.UMBC.EDU (Rouben Rostamian)
Distribution: comp
Organization: University of Maryland, Baltimore County
Lines: 17

In article <1651@fallst.UUCP> tkevans@fallst.UUCP (Tim Evans) writes:
>Can someone help me to delete the _first_ occurring blank line of a file
>(whereever it occurs) without deleting subsequent ones?

I do not know to do this in sed, but here's how it can be done in ed:

1. Create a file "mystrip" containing:
ed $1 << 'EOF'
/^$/d
w
q
'EOF'

2. chmod u+x mystrip

3. To strip the first blank line in file "try", do
   mystrip try