Notes

Grep Command

grep -IRil "pattern" /path/to/search

-I Ignore binaries (.bin, .jpg, etc) -R Recursive + follows all symlinks -i Case-insensitive -l Shows only filenames with pattern in the content

-r vs. -R

-r Follows symbolic links by default. It searches through the contents of symbolic links if they point to directories, effectively treating them as directories.

-R Does not follow symbolic links. It treats symbolic links as regular files and does not search through their contents.

grep -r [pattern] . Will NOT follow the symlinks grep -R [pattern] . Will NOT follow the symlinks grep -r [pattern] * WILL follow symlinks

Locate Command

Remember that locate relies on the updatedb to be up-to-date.

Find Command

find . -print will print only filenames without additional info. The -depth option changes the order in which directories are searched. By default, find traverses the entire directory tree before returning any results. With -depth, it processes each directory and its contents immediately after finding it.

You can disable recursion using the -maxdepth <depth> option find . -maxdepth 1

-exec {}= filename placeholder for exec \;= escaped command terminator for exec