NAME

Acme::CPANModules::GrepVariants - List of grep-like CLI utilities available on CPAN

VERSION

This document describes version 0.011 of Acme::CPANModules::GrepVariants (from Perl distribution Acme-CPANModules-GrepVariants), released on 2023-11-17.

DESCRIPTION

This list catalogs various grep-like tools.

1. Reimplementations

grep (from PerlPowerTools) simply tries to reimplement grep in Perl, as part of the project to reimplement many Unix utilities in Perl. It has few practical uses; mainly educational. The portability advantage of Perl is probably minor as grep and many Unix utilities are now available on other platforms including Windows.

2a. Improvements in recursive searching against files

ack. Created in 2005 by Andy Lester, ack is the granddaddy of grep-like programs that try to improve the experience of using grep to search for text in source code. ack skips VCS directories like .git or .svn, and understands file types so it doesn't look into giant .mp4s and other binaries by default. ack has spurred the development of its improvements (mostly in speed aspect) like The Silver Searcher (ag) (implemented in C) or ripgrep (implemented in Rust). git also now includes a git-grep utility (implemented in C). ack has a website: https://beyondgrep.com. See also https://betterthanack.com.

gre (from App::Gre) is a "grep clone using Perl regexp's with better file filtering, defaults, speed, and presentation". It seems to focus on providing many options to filter files (from including/excluding by file extension, by matching against filename, by first line, by maximum directory depth, and so on). It also offers some alternative output styles.

2b. Improvements in searching for multiple patterns in no particular order

Normally with the regular grep, to search for all 'foo' and 'bar' in no particular order, you either have to do something like:

% grep --color=always foo FILES | grep bar

or:

% grep -P 'foo.*bar|bar.*foo' FILES

both of which get unwieldy if the number of patterns get higher. Or you can use look-ahead:

% grep -P '(?=.*foo)(?=.*bar)' FILES

but this does not capture (thus highlight) the patterns. To do that, you can pipe to grep once more:

% grep -P '(?=.*foo)(?=.*bar)' FILES | grep -P '(foo|bar)'

but you introduce the complications of double filtering (e.g. filenames in FILES is now the subject of the second grep).

Note that searching for multiple patterns in particular order ('foo.*bar'), or searching for aternates from multiple patterns ('foo|bar') is no problem in grep.

Some tools have been written to make it easier to specify multiple patterns:

abgrep (from App::abgrep) sports a --all option to require all patterns to appear in a line (in no particular order). Normally, when multiple patterns are given (via multiple -e or --regexp options), grep will include lines that just contain at least one of the patterns.

greple (from App::Greple). By default, greple only display lines that contain all patterns, instead of just one. greple also has a few other tricks up its sleeve, like configuration file to define complex regexes, matching across lines, and Japanese text support.

grep-terms (from App::GrepUtils) is a grep wrapper to convert multiple terms into a chain of look-ahead patterns like described above. This allows you to use the standard grep.

3. Variants: alternate ways of specifying regex

Instead of specifying a pattern, with rpgrep (from App::rpgrep) you can specify a pattern name in a Regexp::Pattern::* module instead.

With wcgrep (from App::wcgrep) you can search using wildcard pattern instead of regex, which is admittedly more limited than regex.

4a. Variants: alternate source: repository (version control system) content and history

For git, the abovementioned git-grep can search for files in the work tree as well as commit content. For Mercurial, hg grep accomplishes the same. Alternatively you can dump the history then use the standard grep to go through it.

4b. Variants: alternate source: Perl source code

pmgrep (from App::pmgrep) lets you grep over locally installed Perl modules. It's basically a shortcut for something like this:

% pmlist -Rx | xargs grep PAT
% grep PAT $(pmlist -Rx)

cpangrep (from App::cpangrep) is a CLI for web service https://cpan.grep.me, which is no longer operating. To grep from files on CPAN, use https://metacpan.org.

grepl (from App::Grepl) uses PPI to let you grep over Perl documents; it allows you to do things like: search only in Perl code comments or inside string literals.

podgrep (from pmtools) greps from POD sections of Perl source.

4b. Variants: alternate source: CSV

csvgrep (from csvgrep)

csv-grep (from App::CSVUtils) allows you to apply Perl code against rows of CSV.

4c. Variants: alternate source: word lists

wordlist (from App::wordlist) greps words from wordlist modules (modules that contains word lists, see WordList).

4d. Variants: other alternate sources

grep-from-bash-history (from App::BashHistoryUtils).

grep-from-iod (from App::IODUtils).

grep-from-ini (from App::INIUtils).

grep-from-coin (from App::CryptoCurrencyUtils).

grep-from-exchange (from App::CryptoCurrencyUtils).

jgrep (from App::JsonLogUtils).

pdfgrep (alias: grep-from-pdf) (from App::PDFUtils) searches against text in PDF files (it's a wrapper for pdftotext utility and grep).

ptargrep (from Archive::Tar) searches against table of contents of tar files.

5a. Variants: searching URLs

grep-url (from App::grep::url) greps URLs from lines of input. You don't have to manually specify regex that matches URLs yourself; you can just add additional criteria for the URLs, e.g. whether the host part must contain some text, or whether a certain query parameter must match some pattern.

5b. Variants: searching dates

grep-date (from App::grep::date) greps for dates in lines of text.

dategrep (from App::dategrep) prints lines matching a date range.

ACME::CPANMODULES ENTRIES

PerlPowerTools: Author: BDFOY
ack
App::Gre: Author: JACOBG
App::abgrep: Author: PERLANCAR
App::Greple: Author: UTASHIRO
App::GrepUtils: Author: PERLANCAR
App::rpgrep: Author: PERLANCAR
Regexp::Pattern: Author: PERLANCAR
App::wcgrep
App::pmgrep: Author: PERLANCAR
App::cpangrep: Author: TSIBLEY
App::Grepl: Author: OVID
PPI: Author: MITHALDU
pmtools: Author: MLFISHER
csvgrep: Author: NEILB
App::CSVUtils: Author: PERLANCAR
App::wordlist: Author: PERLANCAR
App::BashHistoryUtils: Author: PERLANCAR
App::IODUtils: Author: PERLANCAR
App::INIUtils: Author: PERLANCAR
App::CryptoCurrencyUtils: Author: PERLANCAR
App::JsonLogUtils: Author: JEFFOBER
App::PDFUtils: Author: PERLANCAR
Archive::Tar: Author: BINGOS
App::grep::url: Author: PERLANCAR

FAQ

What is an Acme::CPANModules::* module?

An Acme::CPANModules::* module, like this module, contains just a list of module names that share a common characteristics. It is a way to categorize modules and document CPAN. See Acme::CPANModules for more details.

What are ways to use this Acme::CPANModules module?

Aside from reading this Acme::CPANModules module's POD documentation, you can install all the listed modules (entries) using cpanm-cpanmodules script (from App::cpanm::cpanmodules distribution):

% cpanm-cpanmodules -n GrepVariants

Alternatively you can use the cpanmodules CLI (from App::cpanmodules distribution):

% cpanmodules ls-entries GrepVariants | cpanm -n

or Acme::CM::Get:

% perl -MAcme::CM::Get=GrepVariants -E'say $_->{module} for @{ $LIST->{entries} }' | cpanm -n

or directly:

% perl -MAcme::CPANModules::GrepVariants -E'say $_->{module} for @{ $Acme::CPANModules::GrepVariants::LIST->{entries} }' | cpanm -n

This Acme::CPANModules module also helps lcpan produce a more meaningful result for lcpan related-mods command when it comes to finding related modules for the modules listed in this Acme::CPANModules module. See App::lcpan::Cmd::related_mods for more details on how "related modules" are found.

HOMEPAGE

Please visit the project's homepage at https://metacpan.org/release/Acme-CPANModules-GrepVariants.

SOURCE

Source repository is at https://github.com/perlancar/perl-Acme-CPANModules-GrepVariants.

AUTHOR

perlancar <perlancar@cpan.org>

CONTRIBUTING

To contribute, you can send patches by email/via RT, or send pull requests on GitHub.

Most of the time, you don't need to build the distribution yourself. You can simply modify the code, then test via:

% prove -l

If you want to build the distribution (e.g. to try to install it locally on your system), you can install Dist::Zilla, Dist::Zilla::PluginBundle::Author::PERLANCAR, Pod::Weaver::PluginBundle::Author::PERLANCAR, and sometimes one or two other Dist::Zilla- and/or Pod::Weaver plugins. Any additional steps required beyond that are considered a bug and can be reported to me.

COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE

This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as the Perl 5 programming language system itself.

BUGS

Please report any bugs or feature requests on the bugtracker website https://rt.cpan.org/Public/Dist/Display.html?Name=Acme-CPANModules-GrepVariants

When submitting a bug or request, please include a test-file or a patch to an existing test-file that illustrates the bug or desired feature.

To install Acme::CPANModules::GrepVariants, copy and paste the appropriate command in to your terminal.

cpanm

cpanm Acme::CPANModules::GrepVariants

CPAN shell

perl -MCPAN -e shell
install Acme::CPANModules::GrepVariants

For more information on module installation, please visit the detailed CPAN module installation guide.

	Global
`s`	Focus search bar
`?`	Bring up this help dialog

	GitHub
`g` `p`	Go to pull requests
`g` `i`	go to github issues (only if github is preferred repository)

	POD
`g` `a`	Go to author
`g` `c`	Go to changes
`g` `i`	Go to issues
`g` `d`	Go to dist
`g` `r`	Go to repository/SCM
`g` `s`	Go to source
`g` `b`	Go to file browse

	Search terms
module: (e.g. module:Plugin)
distribution: (e.g. distribution:Dancer auth)
author: (e.g. author:SONGMU Redis)
version: (e.g. version:1.00)