FGREP(1) (Directory and File Management Utilities) FGREP(1)
NAME
fgrep - search a file for a character string
SYNOPSIS
fgrep [options] string [file ...]
DESCRIPTION
fgrep (fast grep) seaches files for a character string and
prints all lines that contain that string. fgrep is
different from grep(1) and egrep(1) because it searches for
a string, instead of searching for a pattern that matches an
expression. It uses a fast and compact algorithm.
The characters $, *, [, ^, |, (, ), and \ are interpreted
literally by fgrep, that is, fgrep does not recognize full
regular expressions as does egrep. Since these characters
have special meaning to the shell, it is safest to enclose
the entire string in single quotes '...'.
If no files are specified, fgrep assumes standard input.
Normally, each line found is copied to the standard output.
The file name is printed before each line found if there is
more than one input file.
Command line options are:
-b Precede each line by the block number on which it was
found. This can be useful in locating block numbers
by context (first block is 0).
-c Print only a count of the lines that contain the
pattern.
-i Ignore upper/lower case distinction during
comparisons.
-l Print the names of files with matching lines once,
separated by new-lines. It does not repeat the names
of files when the pattern is found more than once.
-n Precede each line by its line number in the file
(first line is 1).
-v Print all lines except those that contain the pattern.
-x Print only lines matched entirely.
Page 1 May 1989
FGREP(1) (Directory and File Management Utilities) FGREP(1)
-e special_string
Search for a special string (string begins with a -).
-f file
Take the list of strings from file.
SEE ALSO
ed(1), egrep(1), grep(1), sed(1), sh(1).
DIAGNOSTICS
Exit status is 0 if any matches are found, 1 if none, 2 for
syntax errors or inaccessible files (even if matches were
found).
BUGS
Ideally there should be only one grep command, but there is
not a single algorithm that spans a wide enough range of
space-time tradeoffs. Lines are limited to BUFSIZ
characters; longer lines are truncated. BUFSIZ is defined
in /usr/include/stdio.h.
Page 2 May 1989