diff --git a/automation_tools/main_version_checker.sh b/automation_tools/main_version_checker.sh
index 87011bfd..b5c68269 100755
--- a/automation_tools/main_version_checker.sh
+++ b/automation_tools/main_version_checker.sh
@@ -7,7 +7,6 @@ source automation_tools/version_extractor.sh
 # Set the file paths
 appdata="net.retrodeck.retrodeck.appdata.xml"
 manifest="net.retrodeck.retrodeck.yml"
-manifest_content=$(cat "$manifest")
 
 compare_versions() {
     local manifest_version_cleaned=$(echo "$1" | sed 's/[a-zA-Z]//g')
diff --git a/automation_tools/version_extractor.sh b/automation_tools/version_extractor.sh
index b9f679ff..4838826b 100755
--- a/automation_tools/version_extractor.sh
+++ b/automation_tools/version_extractor.sh
@@ -29,6 +29,6 @@ fetch_manifest_version(){
     # Use awk to extract the value of the first iteration of VERSION variable
     manifest_version=$(echo "$manifest_content" | awk '/VERSION=/ && !/#/ { sub(/.*VERSION=/, ""); sub(/#.*/, ""); print; exit }')
     # Trim leading and trailing whitespace
-    manifest_version=$(echo "$manifest_version" | awk '{$1=$1;print}')
+    manifest_version=$(echo "$manifest_version" | awk '{gsub(/[^0-9.a-zA-Z]/,""); print}')
     echo "$manifest_version"
 }