Grep1. Linux abbreviation for "get regular expression". A grep tool lets you search through a set of text files for a pattern called the regular expression, which is a syntax that lets you specify in great detail what kind of text you're looking for. From Linux Guide @FirstLinux 2. /grep/ vi. [from the qed/ed editor idiom g/re/p, where re stands for a regular expression, to Globally search for the Regular Expression and Print the lines containing matches to it, via Unix grep(1)] To rapidly scan a file or set of files looking for a particular string or pattern (when browsing through a large set of files, one may speak of `grepping around'). By extension, to look for something by pattern. "Grep the bulletin board for the system backup schedule, would you?" See also vgrep. [It has also been alleged that the source is from the title of a paper "A General Regular Expression Parser" -ESR] From Jargon Dictionary 3. GNU grep, egrep and fgrep. The GNU family of grep utilities may be the "fastest grep in the west". GNU grep is based on a fast lazy-state deterministic matcher (about twice as fast as stock Unix egrep) hybridized with a Boyer-Moore-Gosper search for a fixed string that eliminates impossible text from being considered by the full regexp matcher without necessarily having to look at every character. The result is typically many times faster than Unix grep or egrep. (Regular expressions containing backreferencing will run more slowly, however.) From Debian 3.0r0 APT 4. The GNU versions of commonly used grep utilities. Grep searches one ormore input files for lines which contain a match to a specified pattern and then prints the matching lines. GNU's grep utilities include grep, egrep and fgrep.You should install grep on your system, because it is a very useful utility for searching through text files, for system administration tasks, etc. From Mandrake 9.0 RPM 5. print lines matching a pattern From whatis |
