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MS DOS Command: FINDSTR

Reference from Microsoft WinXP cmd help

Description

Searches for strings in files.

Syntax

FINDSTR [/B] [/E] [/L] [/R] [/S] [/I] [/X] [/V] [/N] [/M] [/O] [/P] [/F:file] [/C:string] [/G:file] [/D:dir list] [/A:color attributes] [/OFF[LINE]] strings [[drive:][path]filename[ ...]]

Parameters

/B	Matches pattern if at the beginning of a line.
/E	Matches pattern if at the end of a line.
/L	Uses search strings literally.
/R	Uses search strings as regular expressions.
/S	Searches for matching files in the current directory and all subdirectories.
/I	Specifies that the search is not to be case-sensitive.
/X	Prints lines that match exactly.
/V	Prints only lines that do not contain a match.
/N	Prints the line number before each line that matches.
/M	Prints only the filename if a file contains a match.
/O	Prints character offset before each matching line.
/P	Skip files with non-printable characters.
/OFF[LINE]	Do not skip files with offline attribute set.
/A:attr	Specifies color attribute with two hex digits. See "color /?"
/F:file	Reads file list from the specified file(/ stands for console).
/C:string	Uses specified string as a literal search string.
/G:file	Gets search strings from the specified file(/ stands for console).
/D:dir	Search a semicolon delimited list of directories
strings	Text to be searched for.
[drive:][path]filename	Specifies a file or files to search.

Remarks

Use spaces to separate multiple search strings unless the argument is prefixed with /C. For example, 'FINDSTR "hello there" x.y' searches for "hello" or "there" in file x.y. 'FINDSTR /C:"hello there" x.y' searches for "hello there" in file x.y.

Regular expression quick reference:

.	Wildcard: any character
*	Repeat: zero or more occurances of previous character or class
^	Line position: beginning of line
$	Line position: end of line
[class]	Character class: any one character in set
[^class]	Inverse class: any one character not in set
[x-y]	Range: any characters within the specified range
\x	Escape: literal use of metacharacter x
\<xyz	Word position: beginning of word
xyz\>	Word position: end of word