What about simply adding a `q` command after the first replacement so only that one is handled?
I don't know how to do, my sed skills are still on a beginner level and I guess this will remain so :). Tried: `sed -e 's/^( *version: *)[^,]*(,)/\1'"'$VER'"'\2/;q' -i meson.build` but then `sed` stops any processing directly after the first line and since we modify the file inline, `meson.build` only has its first line left.
Then I tried: `sed -e 's/^( *version: *)[^,]*(,)/\1'"'$VER'"'\2/1' -i meson.build` which should, to my understanding, replace only the first match of the regex and then stop. In my tests, it replaced multiple matches anyway.
After all, I think this is a rather small problem and once it occurs, we can handle it. Again, it is only the version-bump script.