Linux Shells by Example

fgrep—search a file for a character string

fgrep [ –bchilnsvx ] [ –e special string ]
[ –f filename ] [ strings ] [ filename…]

fgrep (fast grep) searches files for a character string and prints all lines that contain that string. fgrep is different from grep(1) and egrep(1) because it interprets regular expression metacharacters as literals. (See grep and grep -F in Chapter 3.)

Example A.25.

1 fgrep '***' * 2 fgrep '[ ] * ? $' filex

Explanation

1. Displays any line containing three asterisks from each file in the present directory. All characters are treated as themselves; i.e., metacharacters are not special.

2. Displays any lines in filex containing the string enclosed in quotes.