Documentation

ugrep – ultra fast grep with interactive TUI

The ugrep utility searches any given input files, selecting lines that match one or more patterns.

By default, a pattern matches an input line if the regular expression (RE) matches the input line. A pattern matches multiple input lines if the RE in the pattern matches one or more newlines in the input. An empty pattern matches every line. Each input line that matches at least one of the patterns is written to the standard output.

This is free and open source software.

Features include:

  • Ultra fast with new match algorithms and features beating grep, ripgrep, silver searcher, ack, sift, etc.
  • Cross-platform support – runs under Linux, macOS, Windows, and more.
  • Supports all GNU/BSD grep standard options; ugrep is a faster compatible replacement for GNU/BSD grep.
  • Matches Unicode patterns by default in UTF-8, UTF-16, UTF-32 encoded files.
  • Matches multiple lines with \n and \R regex patterns.
  • Built-in help: ugrep –help WHAT displays options related to WHAT you are looking for
  • User-friendly with sensible defaults and customizable configuration files used by the ug command intended for interactive use that loads a .ugrep configuration file with your preferences.
  • Interactive query TUI, press F1 or CTRL-Z for help and TAB/SHIFT-TAB to navigate to dirs and files.
  • Find approximate pattern matches with fuzzy search, within the specified Levenshtein distance.
  • Search with Google-like Boolean query patterns using --bool patterns.
  • Fzf-like search with regex (or fixed strings with -F), fuzzy matching with up to 4 extra characters.
  • Search the contents of archives (cpio, jar, tar, pax, zip) and compressed files (zip, gz, Z, bz, bz2, lzma, xz, lz4, zstd).
  • Search pdf, doc, docx, xls, xlxs, and more using filters.
  • Search binary files and display hexdumps with binary pattern matches (Unicode text or -U for byte patterns).
  • Include files to search by filename extensions or exclude them.
  • Include files to search by file types or file “magic bytes” or exclude them.
  • Include files and directories to search that match gitignore-style globs or exclude them.
  • Include hidden files (dotfiles) and directories to search (omitted by default).
  • Exclude files specified by .gitignore etc.
  • Search patterns excluding negative patterns (“match this but not that”).

Website: github.com/Genivia/ugrep
Support:
Developer: Robert van Engelen
License: BSD 3-Clause “New” or “Revised” License

ugrep in action

ugrep man page

ugrep is written in C++. Learn C++ with our recommended free books and free tutorials.

Alternatives to grep


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