How do I search for a text in a directory in Unix?

To include all subdirectories in a search, add the -r operator to the grep command. This command prints the matches for all files in the current directory, subdirectories, and the exact path with the filename. In the example below, we also added the -w operator to show whole words, but the output form is the same.

How do I search for a string in a directory in Linux?

Finding text strings within files using grep

  1. -r – Recursive search.
  2. -R – Read all files under each directory, recursively.
  3. -n – Display line number of each matched line.
  4. -s – Suppress error messages about nonexistent or unreadable files.

How do I search for a string in all text in a directory?

If you’d like to always search within file contents for a specific folder, navigate to that folder in File Explorer and open the “Folder and Search Options.” On the “Search” tab, select the “Always search file names and contents” option.

How do I search for a word in a text file in Linux?

How to Find a Specific Word in a File on Linux

  1. grep -Rw ‘/path/to/search/’ -e ‘pattern’
  2. grep –exclude=*.csv -Rw ‘/path/to/search’ -e ‘pattern’
  3. grep –exclude-dir={dir1,dir2,*_old} -Rw ‘/path/to/search’ -e ‘pattern’
  4. find . – name “*.php” -exec grep “pattern” {} \;

How do I grep a string in a directory in Linux?

To grep All Files in a Directory Recursively, we need to use -R option. When -R options is used, The Linux grep command will search given string in the specified directory and subdirectories inside that directory. If no folder name is given, grep command will search the string inside the current working directory.

How do I search for a text file in Linux?

Basic Examples

  1. find . – name thisfile.txt. If you need to know how to find a file in Linux called thisfile.
  2. find /home -name *.jpg. Look for all . jpg files in the /home and directories below it.
  3. find . – type f -empty. Look for an empty file inside the current directory.
  4. find /home -user randomperson-mtime 6 -iname “.db”

How do I search for a directory in Linux?

You need to use find command. It is used to locate files on Linux or Unix-like system. The locate command will search through a prebuilt database of files generated by updatedb. The find command will search live file-system for files that match the search criteria.

How do I search for text in all files in Linux?

To find files containing specific text in Linux, do the following.

  1. Open your favorite terminal app. XFCE4 terminal is my personal preference.
  2. Navigate (if required) to the folder in which you are going to search files with some specific text.
  3. Type the following command: grep -iRl “your-text-to-find” ./

How do I search for text in a text file?

Select Search > Find in Files from the menu. If you like keyboard shortcuts better, use Ctrl-Shift-F to open the search window instead. The find in files configuration window is pretty easy to use as you can ignore most options if you don’t require them.

How do I search for a string in a file in Linux?

To search recursively, use the -r option with grep . As you can see, grep searched multiple directories and indicates where it found the string. You could also specify a directory in your command, but omitting it (as we did in this example) will instruct grep to search every directory in the current path.