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GREP(1) GREP(1)
NAME
grep, egrep - print lines matching a regular expression
SYNOPSIS
grep [ -CVbchilnsvwx ] [ -num ] [ -AB num ] [ [ -e ] expr
| -f file ] [ files ... ]
DESCRIPTION
Grep searches the files listed in the arguments (or stan-
dard input if no files are given) for all lines that con-
tain a match for the given expr. If any lines match, they
are printed.
Also, if any matches were found, grep will exit with a
status of 0, but if no matches were found it will exit
with a status of 1. This is useful for building shell
scripts that use grep as a condition for, for example, the
if statement.
When invoked as egrep the syntax of the expr is slightly
different; See below.
REGULAR EXPRESSIONS
(grep) (egrep)(explanation)
c ca single (non-meta) character matches
itself.
. .matches any single character except new-
line.
\? ?postfix operator; preceeding item is
optional.
* *postfix operator; preceeding item 0 or
more times.
\+ +postfix operator; preceeding item 1 or
more times.
\| |infix operator; matches either argument.
^ ^matches the empty string at the beginning
of a line.
$ $matches the empty string at the end of a
line.
\< \<matches the empty string at the beginning
of a word.
\> \>matches the empty string at the end of a
word.
GNU Project 1988 December 13 1
GREP(1) GREP(1)
[chars] [chars]match any character in the given
class; if the first character
after [ is ^, match any character
not in the given class; a range
of characters may be specified by
first-last; for example, \W
(below) is equivalent to the
class [^A-Za-z0-9]
\( \) ( )parentheses are used to override opera-
tor precedence.
\digit \digit\n matches a repeat of the text
matched earlier in the regexp by
the subexpression inside the nth
opening parenthesis.
\ \any special character may be preceded by a
backslash to match it literally.
(the following are for compatibility with GNU Emacs)
\b \bmatches the empty string at the edge of a
word.
\B \Bmatches the empty string if not at the
edge of a word.
\w \wmatches word-constituent characters (let-
ters & digits).
\W \Wmatches characters that are not word-
constituent.
Operator precedence is (highest to lowest) ?, *, and +,
concatenation, and finally |. All other constructs are
syntactically identical to normal characters. For the
truly interested, the file dfa.c describes (and imple-
ments) the exact grammar understood by the parser.
OPTIONS
-A num print <num> lines of context after every matching
line
-B num print num lines of context before every matching
line
-C print 2 lines of context on each side of every
match
-num print num lines of context on each side of every
match
-V print the version number on the diagnostic output
GNU Project 1988 December 13 2
GREP(1) GREP(1)
-b print every match preceded by its byte offset
-c print a total count of matching lines only
-e expr
search for expr; useful if expr begins with -
-f file
search for the expression contained in file
-h don't display filenames on matches
-i ignore case difference when comparing strings
-l list files containing matches only
-n print each match preceded by its line number
-s run silently producing no output except error mes-
sages
-v print only lines that contain no matches for the
<expr>
-w print only lines where the match is a complete word
-x print only lines where the match is a whole line
SEE ALSO
emacs(1), ed(1), sh(1), GNU Emacs Manual
INCOMPATIBILITIES
The following incompatibilities with UNIX grep exist:
The context-dependent meaning of * is not quite the
same (grep only).
-b prints a byte offset instead of a block offset.
The {m,n} construct of System V grep is not imple-
mented.
BUGS
GNU e?grep has been thoroughly debugged and tested by sev-
eral people over a period of several months; we think it's
a reliable beast or we wouldn't distribute it. If by some
fluke of the universe you discover a bug, send a detailed
description (including options, regular expressions, and a
copy of an input file that can reproduce it) to me,
mike@wheaties.ai.mit.edu.
There is also a newsgroup, gnu.utils.bug, for reporting
FSF utility programs' bugs and fixes; but before reporting
GNU Project 1988 December 13 3
GREP(1) GREP(1)
something as a bug, please try to be sure that it really
is a bug, not a misunderstanding or a deliberate feature.
Also, include the version number of the utility program
you are running in every bug report that you send in.
Please do not send anything but bug reports to this news-
group.
AVAILABILITY
GNU grep is free; anyone may redistribute copies of grep
to anyone under the terms stated in the GNU General Public
License, a copy of which may be found in each copy of GNU
Emacs. See also the comment at the beginning of the
source code file grep.c.
Copies of GNU grep may sometimes be received packaged with
distributions of Unix systems, but it is never included in
the scope of any license covering those systems. Such
inclusion violates the terms on which distribution is per-
mitted. In fact, the primary purpose of the General Pub-
lic License is to prohibit anyone from attaching any other
restrictions to redistribution of any of the Free Software
Foundation programs.
AUTHORS
Mike Haertel wrote the deterministic regexp code and the
bulk of the program.
James A. Woods is responsible for the hybridized search
strategy of using Boyer-Moore-Gosper fixed-string search
as a filter before calling the general regexp matcher.
Arthur David Olson contributed code that finds fixed
strings for the aforementioned BMG search for a large
class of regexps.
Richard Stallman wrote the backtracking regexp matcher
that is used for \digit backreferences, as well as the
getopt that is provided for 4.2BSD sites. The backtrack-
ing matcher was originally written for GNU Emacs.
D. A. Gwyn wrote the C alloca emulation that is provided
so System V machines can run this program. (Alloca is
used only by RMS' backtracking matcher, and then only
rarely, so there is no loss if your machine doesn't have a
"real" alloca.)
Scott Anderson and Henry Spencer designed the regression
tests used in the "regress" script.
Paul Placeway wrote the original version of this manual
page.
GNU Project 1988 December 13 4