Searching files for patterns

[amacbean]

What is the best way to find all the occurances of a string pattern in a file?

I need to find all occurances of the pattern:

'<name>*</name>'

where the * could be any string.

Can this be done using grep?

 

[KenCunningham]

Yes, but (as above) enclose your expression in single quotes, eg

grep '<name>*<name>' file

Cheers.

 

[amacbean]

Thanks but I have tried that.

grep '<name>*</name>' file.txt - this does not work??
grep '<name>*' file.txt - this does!!

Any ideas why?

 

[mi294r3]

amacbean

Try this .... It should work

grep &quot;<name>.*</\name>&quot; file.txt

\n needs to be escaped
AND
When you use an asterisk in a regular expression
it will match any number of the character that
immeadiately precedes it. So ...
grep &quot;<name>*</\name>&quot;

Will match any number of > in between <name>
and <\name>, but . matches any single character
so .* will match any number of any charcter between
<name> and <\name>

Hope what I stated is true and hope it makes sense

JRjr

 

[mi294r3]

amacbean

Sorry I noticed I switched the slash around
</name> to <\name>
All you need to do is

grep &quot;<name>.*</name>&quot; file.txt

Single or double quotes work ..

JRjr