finding files

nmansour · 08-05-2007, 08:54 PM

Hi,

If I want to find all files on my box which contain a certain word, what should I do?

Thanks,

Noha

anomie · 08-05-2007, 09:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by nmansour

files on my box which contain a certain word...

In the filename itself, or in the contents (of, say, an ascii text file)?

If the former, find or locate (if installed) will do it.

If the latter, a recursive grep from the appropriate starting point will do it.

Four · 08-05-2007, 09:33 PM

I would like to know how to search inside files. But for using find do this

list files of "filename"
find /directory/where/you/want/to/search/ -type f | grep "filename"

List directories of "filename"
find /directory/where/you/want/to/search/ -type d | grep "filename"

bigrigdriver · 08-05-2007, 09:44 PM

Quote:

If I want to find all files on my box which contain a certain word, what should I do?

find / -type f | xargs grep "search string"

You will have to run it as root because of the many directories/files to which the normal user doesn't have access.
Replace "search string" with the word/phrase you want to find.

syg00 · 08-05-2007, 10:10 PM

Also use -H on the greps

nmansour · 08-06-2007, 12:32 AM

This is the command I used, and this is what I was given, what does this mean?

find / -type f | xargs grep -H "million"
xargs: unmatched single quote; by default quotes are special to xargs unless you use the -0 option

Noha

Fond_of_Opensource · 08-06-2007, 06:27 AM

Use this command.

# find / -exec -H grep "your_pattern_string" {} \;

nmansour · 08-06-2007, 08:54 AM

I did not find the file which contains the word "million".
It is a regular file and I am sure it is somewhere in my box.

Thanks,

Noha

anomie · 08-06-2007, 09:07 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by nmansour

I did not find the file which contains the word "million".
It is a regular file and I am sure it is somewhere in my box.

A 'regular' file in that it's an ascii text file? (As opposed to a binary OOo or abiword doc?)

If you have no clue where it could be, I'd use:
# grep -IRHi 'million' /*

If you have some idea about which subdirectory it would be under, that'll speed the search up for you.

colucix · 08-06-2007, 09:11 AM

Maybe the word "million" is not lower-case? Following one of the examples above, you can try

Code:

find / -type f -exec grep -Hiw million {} \;

See man grep for details about -i and -w options. Searching from / can take a long time, yet. Hope this helps.