I'm trying to replace all \ with \\ in bash, I'm doing it like this but bash gets stuck in a never-ending loop. Where am I going wrong?
myVar="${myVar//\//\\\\}"
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lnogueir
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Radu Bogdan
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Which version of bash? I can't reproduce an endless loop with this code. – Charles Duffy Apr 19 '21 at 22:15
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@Barmar, ...insofar as the linked duplicate only provides a sed answer and not a PE answer, it strikes me as suboptimal. – Charles Duffy Apr 19 '21 at 22:16
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@CharlesDuffy It shows how to do it in a variable, the fact that it's being put into a sed command seems secondary. I tried to find a more general dupe but failed. – Barmar Apr 19 '21 at 22:17
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Hmm. I _do_ have a working PE-based answer, but I don't think it belongs on the `sed`-centric linked duplicate, and it's distinct from what's already there. – Charles Duffy Apr 19 '21 at 22:17
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1The answer in my dupe *does* use PE: `${newstring//\\/\\\\}/g` – Barmar Apr 19 '21 at 22:18
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You can use sed for that:
echo "hello\world\hello\world" | sed 's/\\/\\\\/g'
Outputs:
hello\\world\\hello\\world
lnogueir
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True, but using `sed` is generally inefficient (for lots repeated calls with small strings) compared to [parameter expansions](https://wiki.bash-hackers.org/syntax/pe). – Charles Duffy Apr 19 '21 at 22:15
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Thanks for the resource, I am not familiar with parameter expansions. Will read about it! – lnogueir Apr 19 '21 at 22:19
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