diff --git a/Cellar/homebrew/brewkit.rb b/Cellar/homebrew/brewkit.rb
index 0c831f9bba..87ae0de878 100644
--- a/Cellar/homebrew/brewkit.rb
+++ b/Cellar/homebrew/brewkit.rb
@@ -149,20 +149,16 @@ private
   end
 end
 
-
 def inreplace(path, before, after)
-  before=before.to_s
-  after=after.to_s
+  before=before.to_s.gsub('"', '\"').gsub('/', '\/')
+  after=after.to_s.gsub('"', '\"').gsub('/', '\/')
 
-  before.gsub! '"', '\"'
-  after.gsub! '"', '\"'
-  before.gsub! '|', '\|"'
-  after.gsub! '|', '\|"'
   # we're not using Ruby because the perl script is more concise
   #TODO the above escapes are worse, use a proper ruby script :P
   #TODO optimise it by taking before and after as arrays
   #Bah, just make the script writers do it themselves with a standard collect block
-  `perl -pi -e "s|#{before}|#{after}|g" "#{path}"`
+  #TODO use ed -- less to escape
+  `perl -pi -e "s/#{before}/#{after}/g" "#{path}"`
 end
 
 def system cmd