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Tip 825 Printable Monobook Previous Next

created November 19, 2004 · complexity basic · author mosh · version 5.7


When #/* will not find a word under-cursor, use the macro 'g/' given below, to expand the same search with gnu-grep to dirs/files.

Search results are shown in a small window (quickfix mode), use c-n/c-p to move between results.

Uses gnu-grep on PC/Unix to search vim \<regexp\> in files/trees. Based on 'grep-find' which is an emacs commands.

" Put this in ~/_vimrc and use g/ to repeat current search as a grep-find.
" Usage
" /xyz .. not found in current file, so lets look for it in *.* with
" g/ .. search for xyz in *.*, next lets look for it in the whole tree
" :call Mosh_grep("../..")
" :call Mosh_grep("/usr/include","strstr")
" GNU-grep -recursive,nocase,linenum,noerror,VimRegexp (in that order).
:set grepprg=grep\ -rinsE
:map g/ :call Mosh_grep()<CR>

function! Mosh_grep(...)
  if a:0 == 0
    :exec "grep '".@/."' *.*"
  elseif a:0 == 1
    :exec "grep '".@/."' " a:1
  elseif a:0 == 2
    :exec "grep" a:2 " " a:1
  endif
  " Optional mappings for easy navigation of results
  :map <c-n> :cnext<CR>
  :map <c-p> :cprev<CR>
  :copen
endfunction

Comments[]

Wouldn't it be helpful to constrain the files to be grepped? E.g. only *.c and *.h files when editing C source?

=> find -name "*.c" | xargs grep "MyFunction"
=> find -name "*.c" -o -name "*.h" | xargs grep "MyFunction"

Or at least, ignoring *~ and *.bak files?


No, no, no! This mapping isn't even using gnu grep as it claims, it's using the :grep Vim command (which, on a Unix system, will utilize the grep tool by default, but it is not at all the same). If you want to limit the file type, just pass in the desired files into the command itself! There is no need to shell out to a find command! See Find in files within Vim.

 TO DO 
Merge this tip somewhere. It basically consists of an incorrect description, and a few very simple mappings.

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