Linux in a Nutshell, Third Edition
by Ellen Siever, Stephen Spainhour, Jessica P. Hekman, Stephen Figgins
Name
egrep
Synopsis
egrep [options] [regexp] [files]
Description
Search one or more files for lines that match an extended regular expression regexp. egrep doesn’t support the regular expressions \(, \), \n, \<, \>, \{, or \} but does support the other expressions, as well as the extended set +, ?, |, and ( ). Remember to enclose these characters in quotes. Regular expressions are described in Chapter 9. Exit status is 0 if any lines match, 1 if none match, and 2 for errors.
See grep for the list of available options. Also see fgrep. egrep typically runs faster than those commands.
Examples
Search for occurrences of Victor or Victoria in file:
egrep 'Victor(ia)*'fileegrep '(Victor|Victoria)'file
Find and print strings such as old.doc1 or new.doc2 in files, and include their line numbers:
egrep -n '(old|new)\.doc?'files
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