Replacing Text

sd: Fast Find & Replace

Always invoke replacing-text skill for find & replace operations - do not execute bash commands directly.

Use sd for intuitive text replacement that's 2-12x faster than sed.

When to Use sd vs ripgrep

Use sd when:

• Performing replacements on known patterns
• Batch text transformations across files
• Need JavaScript-style regex syntax
• Direct file modifications without search first

Use ripgrep when:

• Finding unknown patterns or locations
• Need search results without immediate changes
• Complex file filtering and type matching
• Want to preview before modifying

Common workflow: searching-text skill → replacing-text skill (search first, then replace)

Default Strategy

Invoke replacing-text skill for fast find & replace operations. Use when performing replacements on known patterns, batch text transformations across files, or need JavaScript-style regex syntax.

Common workflow: searching-text skill → replacing-text skill (search first, then replace) or finding-files skill → replacing-text skill for batch operations.

Key Options

• -F for string-literal mode (no regex)
• $1, $2 or ${var} for capture groups
• --preview to preview changes
• -- before patterns starting with -
• $$ for literal $ in replacement

Core Principle

Replace text with familiar JavaScript/Python regex syntax - no sed escape hell.

Detailed Reference

For comprehensive find & replace patterns, regex syntax examples, and workflow tips, load sd guide when needing:

• Advanced regex patterns with capture groups
• Pipeline operations and batch processing
• Escape sequence handling
• Common text transformation recipes
• Integration with other command-line tools

The guide includes:

• String-literal vs regex mode usage
• Capture group patterns and replacements
• Pipeline operations and batch processing
• Advanced regex patterns and edge cases
• Integration with other command-line tools

Skill Combinations

For Discovery Phase

• searching-text → replacing-text: Search patterns first, then replace across matches
• finding-files → replacing-text: Find files and perform batch replacements
• querying-json/querying-yaml → replacing-text: Extract data and transform to other formats

For Analysis Phase

• replacing-text --preview → viewing-files: Preview changes with syntax highlighting
• replacing-text → fuzzy-selecting: Interactive selection of changes to apply
• replacing-text → querying-json/querying-yaml: Transform data back to structured formats

For Refactoring Phase

• replacing-text → searching-text: Verify replacements didn't introduce issues
• replacing-text → analyzing-code-structure: Follow up with structural changes if needed
• replacing-text → analyzing-code: Measure impact of text-based changes

Integration Examples

# Find and replace across project
fd -e js -x sd "oldPattern" "newPattern" --preview

# Chain transformations
cat config.json | jq '.version' | sd '"v' '' | sd '"' '' | xargs git tag

# Interactive replacement with preview
rg "deprecated" -l | fzf --multi | xargs sd "deprecated" "legacy" --preview | bat