Finding within files in Linux...

iago · January 05, 2004, 12:48 PM

I need to search an entire directory/subdirectories for a file containing a specific phrase or pattern, and list the files. I know I can do this with grep, but I don't know how. Can anybody help?

Adron · January 05, 2004, 01:07 PM

grep string *

which will list the hits

Try grep --help and you should get the option required to have it only print the file name of the matching file.

iago · January 05, 2004, 01:41 PM

I found the file the hard way, but I'm sure this will come up again. Thanks!

Thing · January 05, 2004, 03:45 PM

I'm pretty sure it's grep --files-with-matches
Easy huh?

iago · January 05, 2004, 07:14 PM

How do you tell it to do it recursively? Most commands have -R, but I don't think grep does..

Adron · January 06, 2004, 04:13 AM

-r, --recursive equivalent to --directories=recurse.

iago · January 06, 2004, 05:26 AM

Really? hah, I must have missed that. *rereads man page*

Quote-R, -r, --recursive
Read all files under each directory, recursively; this is equivalent to the -d recurse option.

hmm, I have no idea how I missed that one. Oh well, thanks

Adron · January 06, 2004, 08:25 AM

Interesting, mine doesn't seem to support the -R option. It's:

C:\Documents and Settings\Adron>grep --version
grep (GNU grep) 2.4.2

Copyright 1988, 1992-1999, 2000 Free Software Foundation, Inc.
This is free software; see the source for copying conditions. There is NO
warranty; not even for MERCHANTABILITY or FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE.

iago · January 06, 2004, 08:36 AM

Mine is 2.5. I can't paste the whole thing because my Laptop isn't hooked up to the network right now

iago · January 06, 2004, 11:05 AM

hmm, on the version of grep that I'm using on my work computer, it doesn't even have -r. In fact, --version gives me an error. All I know is the man page was written in 1997 :/

Adron · January 06, 2004, 11:36 AM

Hehe, not much use asking us when you have two versions of grep, both different from ours...

Try doing it with find and xargs?

iago · January 06, 2004, 11:59 AM

I've never heard of xargs, I'll look that up after lunch.

And can find search within files? I don't think it can, at least not on this system. :/

Adron · January 06, 2004, 12:16 PM

find can find the names of all files
xargs can parse out the names and pass them to another program on the command line
grep can search files for strings

Combine those:

find . | xargs grep somestring
find . -print0 | xargs grep -0 somestring

-print0 makes it work for filenames that contain evil characters such as space or similar.

cipher · January 06, 2004, 08:59 PM

heh, grep for DOS, didn't know that existed. too bad you can't just do like a ls -lR <dir> | grep <file>. bet there's no piping like that }=)

btw, if you have a working slocate db you can try a 'locate <file>' if it gives you an error about not having generated a database try an updatedb, if that too fails then let me know; i know that there is a way to force it to generate a new db, just can't remember off the top of my head.

Kp · January 07, 2004, 12:19 AM

Quote from: cipher on January 06, 2004, 08:59 PM
heh, grep for DOS, didn't know that existed. too bad you can't just do like a ls -lR <dir> | grep <file>. bet there's no piping like that }=)

That will work, and will list the files which match a pattern. iago wanted to know which files contained a pattern, though.