How can I remove the last character of the last line of a file?

Question

I have this set of lines in a file:

{info},
{info},
{info},
{info},

and I want the file like this without the last ",":

{info},
{info},
{info},
{info}

How can I do it in bash? Any idea?

score 24 · Answer 1 · answered Nov 12 '15 at 19:52

24

You can use sed:

sed '$ s/.$//' your_file

Note that you can use whatever separator you want instead of /, for example you can rewrite the expression:

sed '$ s-.$--' your_file

answered Nov 12 '15 at 19:52

Maroun

@Joa your're welcome :) Try to understand why it works and let me know if there's something you don't understand. – Maroun Nov 12 '15 at 19:58
doesn't update the file. – Alexey Dmitriev Feb 06 '18 at 15:58
1

@AlexeyDmitriev Use `-i` flag to change in-place. – Maroun Feb 06 '18 at 16:07
If you want to replace the last "," on the last line with "]" in a json file: `sed '$ s/.$/\]/' your_file` – Rodrigo Polo Jul 04 '19 at 01:15
1

I did not search for this one but your explanation was just great! – Ugur Kazdal Apr 13 '20 at 07:59

score 1 · Answer 2 · answered Nov 12 '15 at 19:58

In vim, you could use :substitute or :s to do this as well. It's a vim-built in -- you can read about it here http://vim.wikia.com/wiki/Search_and_replace

The syntax is very similar to the other posted solution, you'd go into the command mode and type in :$s/.$//g

2 Answers2