sed replace exact match

Question

I want to change some names in a file using sed. This is how the file looks like:

#! /bin/bash

SAMPLE=\"sample_name\"
FULLSAMPLE=\"full_sample_name\"

...
         


        

Answer 1

@user1987607

You can do this the following way:

sed s/"sample_name">/sample_01/g

where having "sample_name" in quotes " " matches the exact string value.

/g is for global replacement.

If "sample_name" occurs like this ifsample_name and you want to replace that as well then you should use the following:

sed s/"sample_name ">/"sample_01 "/g

So that it replaces only the desired word. For example the above syntax will replace word "the" from a text file and not from words like thereby.

If you are interested in replacing only first occurence, then this would work fine

sed s/"sample_name"/sample_01/

Hope it helps