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FIND

Posted On 2005-11-1 by FortyPoundHead
Keywords: Command Reference
Tags: Windows Commandline Windows
Views: 1513

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FIND

Search for a text string in a file & display all the lines where it is found.



syntax



      FIND [/V] [/C] [/N] [/I] "string" [pathname(s)]



Key



   /V  : Display all lines NOT containing the specified string.

   /C  : Count the number of lines containing the string.

   /N  : Display Line numbers.

   /I  : Ignore the case of characters when searching for the string.

   "string"   : The text string to find (must be in quotes).

   [pathname] : A drive, file or files to search.



If a [pathname] is not specified, FIND will prompt for text input or will accept text piped from another command.



(use CTRL-Z to end manual text input)



For example:



If names.txt contains the following:



  Joe Bloggs, 123 Main St, Dunoon

  Arnold Jones, 127 Scotland Street, Edinburgh



To search for "Jones" in names.txt



FIND "Jones" names.txt



Names.Txt:

Arnold Jones, 127 Scotland Street, Edinburgh



If you want to pipe a command into FIND use this syntax



TYPE names.txt | FIND "Jones"



You can also redirect like this



FIND /i "Jones" < names.txt >logfile.txt



To search a folder for files that contain a given search string





FOR %G IN (*.txt) do (find /n /i "SearchWord" "%G")



Bugs/Limitations

Although FIND can be used to scan large files, it will not detect any string that is positioned more than 1070 characters along a single line (with no carriage return) This makes it of limited use in searching binary or XML file types.

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