[SOLVED] Search for a word in multiple ODT files

NotAComputerGuy · 05-10-2016, 08:43 AM

Hi,

I'm trying to find specific words within multiple documents. All the answers so far result in nothing. Does anyone know a way I can search the contents of a folder containing multiple odt files for a specific word please?

I'm using LMDE and Libre office 1:4.3.3-2+deb8u3

Thanks

HMW · 05-10-2016, 08:53 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by NotAComputerGuy

Does anyone know a way I can search the contents of a folder containing multiple odt files for a specific word please

Yes:
http://ubuntuforums.org/showthread.p...06#post5859706
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questi...es-4175511386/
http://superuser.com/questions/68220...ep-not-working

DuckDuckGo is your friend...

Best regards,
HMW

NotAComputerGuy · 05-10-2016, 09:37 AM

The first link I've tried and none of the results listed return anything. I search for the word "the" which occurs multiple times in multiple documents and it displays nothing.

The second link states "ODT files are ZIP files containing a structure of files and directories. You can unzip them. The text is in xml format in content.xml." but I've got no idea how I would unzip multiple files and then search them all for a word. It seems unlikely that it's possible in my extremely limited knowledge. A single file I could achieve but multiple files seems unlikely.

The third results in:
caution: filename not matched: /home/user/path/to/documents/doc1.odt
caution: filename not matched: /home/user/path/to/documents/doc2.odt
caution: filename not matched: /home/user/path/to/documents/doc3.odt
/usr/bin/zipgrep: 97: test: -eq: unexpected operator
/usr/bin/zipgrep: 100: test: Illegal number:

Thanks for trying though. You say you know how it can be done, could you tell me directly please?

NotAComputerGuy · 05-10-2016, 09:54 AM

People who come across this thread in future.

I found

Code:

for file in *.odt; do     unzip -c "$file" | grep -iq insertsearchtexthere && echo "$file"; done

to be the answer assuming all the files are in one directory.

That was found here: https://superuser.com/questions/6822...ep-not-working

keefaz · 05-10-2016, 11:28 AM

Code:

zgrep -i -l insertsearchtexthere *.odt

No?
[edit]
Ah ok, zgrep is for gziped files...

HMW · 05-10-2016, 01:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by NotAComputerGuy

Thanks for trying though. You say you know how it can be done, could you tell me directly please?

You solved it yourself

Awesome!

Best regards,
HMW

HMW · 05-10-2016, 01:26 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by NotAComputerGuy

The first link I've tried and none of the results listed return anything. I search for the word "the" which occurs multiple times in multiple documents and it displays nothing

But... this is strange.

I tried this solution myself and it works as one could expect. I have an .odt file with this content:
”Document containing keyword foo

End!“

This is located here on my machine

Code:

/home/HMW/Dokument/test.odt

Now, if I run the following (searchodt.sh):

Code:

find $HOME/Dokument -name "*.odt" | while read file
do
        unzip -ca "$file" content.xml | grep -qli "foo"
        if [ $? -eq 0 ]; then
                echo "Found keyword in: " $file
        fi  
done

I get this result:

Code:

./searchodt.sh 
Found keyword in:  /home/HMW/Dokument/test.odt

Not that it matters since you have already solved this, but it is odd it didn't work on your end.

Best regards,
HMW