Perl as grep

ibanix has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Hi folks,

I'm on a Windows server with ActivePerl, but no grep. How can I make perl work like grep -- with the command line?

I tried perl -p "*.*" -e "print $_ if /regex/" and it's complaining about the *.*.

The line interface for perl isn't my forte, can anyone offer me help?

Thanks!
ibanix

$ echo '$0 & $0 &' > foo; chmod a+x foo; foo;

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Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Perl as grep by duff (Parson) on Dec 02, 2003 at 15:19 UTC
I tried `perl -p "." -e "print $_ if /regex/"` and it's complaining about the `.`. Aye, that's because you've got it in the wrong place. It looks like you want: `perl -ne "print if /regex/" .` or maybe `perl -pe "next unless /regex/" .` Though I'm not sure about the globbing under windows. I seem to recall that each program must do its own. Perhaps what you really need is this: `perl -ne "BEGIN { @ARGV = glob(qq(@ARGV)); } print if /regex/" "."` [download] caveat lector! this code is untested. PerlJam	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re^2: Perl as grep (-p/next) by tye (Sage) on Dec 02, 2003 at 18:36 UTC
duff++ Note that one of your examples: `perl -pe "next unless /regex/" .` [download] doesn't do what you think. -p puts the print statement in the `while(<>)` loop's continue block and so it will get called when you call next. So that one-liner prints all lines of a file named "." (yes, you are correct about globbing, much to my consternation -- the reasons for this are nonsense), just not as efficiently because it applies a regex to each line and then effectively ignores the result of that test. - tye	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Perl as grep by gjb (Vicar) on Dec 02, 2003 at 15:22 UTC
The `-p` argument doesn't take an argument and prints any line read. What you want is: `perl -n -e "print if /regex/" .` [download] Hope this helps, -gjb-	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Perl as grep by shotgunefx (Parson) on Dec 02, 2003 at 16:23 UTC
You can check out the Perl Power Tools project. A perl grep is available here. -Lee "To be civilized is to deny one's nature."	[reply]
Re: Perl as grep by Abigail-II (Bishop) on Dec 02, 2003 at 16:20 UTC
Is making perl act as grep really the solution for your problem? Today you want to Unix tool grep on Windows, tomorrow something else. Why not install one of the Unix tool packages for Windows, like cygwin? Abigail	[reply]
Re: Re: Perl as grep by ibanix (Hermit) on Dec 02, 2003 at 18:33 UTC
You assume I am allowed to install cygwin on it :-) `$ echo '$0 & $0 &' > foo; chmod a+x foo; foo;`	[reply] [d/l]
Re: Perl as grep by Anonymous Monk on Dec 02, 2003 at 18:55 UTC
Non Perl Answer for WinNT/2000/XP in CMD.EXE is `findstr` dose some of grep's functions and it does (an MS) regex search. MADuran	[reply] [d/l]
Re: Perl as grep by DrHyde (Prior) on Dec 02, 2003 at 15:23 UTC
The solution is on your friendly local CPAN mirror: here	[reply]
Re: Perl as grep by cored (Scribe) on Dec 02, 2003 at 15:47 UTC
Maybe this can help you `perl -e '/regex/&&print'` [download]	[reply] [d/l]

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