they also have left bracket symbols in them right after those escape characters. There is for those interested a sed-users list send blank e-mail to sed-users-subscribe@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx to subscribe. Rarely the list gets spammed, but forwarding spam on yahoogroups.com lists to abuse@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx can help. Mostly that list is on topic and anyone who subscribes will be in contact with the developers of sed along with other interested subscribers. _______________________________________________ Blinux-list@xxxxxxxxxx https://www.redhat.com/mailman/listinfo/blinux-list