Question

I am trying to script the automatic input of file, which is as follows

*CONTACT_FORMING_ONE_WAY_SURFACE_TO_SURFACE
$#     cid                                                                 title
$#    ssid      msid     sstyp     mstyp    sboxid    mboxid       spr       mpr
     1         2         3         3         0         0         0         0
$#      fs        fd        dc        vc       vdc    penchk        bt        dt
0.0100          0.000     0.000     0.000     0.000         0     0.000 1.0000E+7
$#     sfs       sfm       sst       mst      sfst      sfmt       fsf       vsf
1.000000  1.000000     0.000     0.000  1.000000  1.000000  1.000000  1.000000
*CONTACT_FORMING_ONE_WAY_SURFACE_TO_SURFACE
$#     cid                                                                 title
$#    ssid      msid     sstyp     mstyp    sboxid    mboxid       spr       mpr
     1         3         3         3         0         0         0         0
$#      fs        fd        dc        vc       vdc    penchk        bt        dt
0.0100          0.000     0.000     0.000     0.000         0     0.000 1.0000E+7
$#     sfs       sfm       sst       mst      sfst      sfmt       fsf       vsf
1.000000  1.000000     0.000     0.000  1.000000  1.000000  1.000000  1.000000

I want to changed fifth line after the string

 *CONTACT_FORMING_ONE_WAY_SURFACE_TO_SURFACE

with a line from other file frictionValues.txt

What I am using is as follows

sed -i -e '/^\*CONTACT_FORMING_ONE_WAY_SURFACE_TO_SURFACE/{n;n;n;n;n;R frictionValues.txt' -e 'd}' input.txt

but this changes all the 5 lines after the string but it reads the values 2 times from the file frictionValues.txt. I want that it reads only first line and then copy it at all the instance where it finds the string. Can anybody tell me using sed with inplace editing like this one?

Answer 1

This might work for you (I might be well off the mark as to what you want!):

sed '1s|.*|1{x;s/^/&/;x};/^\*CONTACT_FORMING_ONE_WAY_SURFACE_TO_SURFACE/{n;n;n;n;n;G;s/.*\\n//}|;q' frictionValues.txt |
sed -i -f - input.txt

Explanation:

• Build a sed script from the first line of the frictionValues.txt that stuffs the said first line into the hold space (HS). The remaining script is as before but instead of R frictionValues.txt appends the HS to the pattern space using G.
• Run the above sed script against the input.txt file using the -f - switch the sed script is passed via stdin from the previous pipeline.