sed can't replace files in a different directory

[crhistianramirez]

shx version: 0.3.2
npm version: 6.9.0
node version: 10.16.0

I'm trying to replace some text for a file in a child folder /docs.

I run this command:

shx sed -i 's/globals.html/index.html/g' docs/index.html

And get the error: sed: no files given

I've confirmed this works with the vanilla unix sed command. Steps to reproduce:

1. git clone https://github.com/crhistianramirez/shx-bug-repro-sed.git
2. cd shx-bug-repro-sed
3. npm install
4. npm run bug

[nfischer]

Does it work correctly like this?

shx sed -i 's/globals.html/index.html/g' index.html # file in same folder

[crhistianramirez]

No, it does not. I get the same error

sed: no files given

[nfischer]

Which operating system? I can't repro on Linux.

[crhistianramirez]

Ah, I'm using Windows 10

[nfischer]

Can you check if the corresponding shelljs method call works? I don't have a windows box to repro.

[crhistianramirez]

Made one more commit - https://github.com/crhistianramirez/shx-bug-repro-sed.git

and was not able to reproduce with shelljs. The following code successfully replaces the text as I expect it to:

const shell = require('shelljs');
shell.sed('-i', /globals.html/g, 'index.html', 'docs/index.html');

So it looks like it has to do with how the parameters are getting passed to the cli. I'll see if I can dig into that code a bit more over the weekend.

[crhistianramirez]

Tracked this down to a bug with how minimist is parsing the arguments. Seems to be escaping the single quotes when the environment is windows and the command is run from a node script. I've submitted a bug report but the last commit to that repository was 4 years ago.

This command: shx sed -i 's/globals.html/index.html/g' docs/index.html while run as a node script yields the following parsed arguments from minimist.

WINDOWS

{ _: [ 'sed', 'index.html' ], i: '\'s/globals.html/index.html/g\'' }

MAC

{ _: [ 'sed', 'index.html' ], i: 's/globals.html/index.html/g' }

[nfischer]

Are you sure it's minimist at fault? Isn't that because of what process.argv looks like, because Windows sends single quotes to the child process argv?

[crhistianramirez]

🤦‍♂ Yep, that was it.

Hmm kind of a bummer that windows handles it that way. So it looks like maybe just escaping double quotes is the way to go. This command works from an npm script:

shx sed -i \"s/globals.html/index.html/g\" docs/index.html

Might be good to add this to the docs since shx is meant primarily to be run from an npm script. Mind if I add it?

[nfischer]

Ah I see, this is in package.json like so:

{
  "scripts": {
    "foo": "shx sed -i \"s/globals.html/index.html/g\" docs/index.html"
  }
}

Now I see the appeal of single quotes, although I think we've found those don't work.

For your specific case, you can omit quotes entirely:

    "foo": "shx sed -i s/globals.html/index.html/g docs/index.html"

But in general, yeah this is something we might document.

[crhistianramirez]

Ah didn't know that, more my ignorance I'm sure. I've just started playing around with the command line.

I'll close this issue then. Thank you very much for your help @nfischer it was very much appreciated :)