I have a log file (application.log) which might contain the following string of normal & special characters on multiple lines:
*^%Q&$*&^@$&*!^@$*&^&^*&^&
I want to search for the line number(s) which contains this special character string.
grep '*^%Q&$*&^@$&*!^@$*&^&^*&^&' application.log
The above command doesn't return any results.
What would be the correct syntax to get the line numbers?
Tell grep
to treat your input as fixed string using -F
option.
grep -F '*^%Q&$*&^@$&*!^@$*&^&^*&^&' application.log
Option -n
is required to get the line number,
grep -Fn '*^%Q&$*&^@$&*!^@$*&^&^*&^&' application.log
The one that worked for me is:
grep -e '->'
The -e means that the next argument is the pattern, and won't be interpreted as an argument.
From: http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/programming-9/how-to-grep-for-string-769460/
A related note
To grep for carriage return, namely the \r
character, or 0x0d
, we can do this:
grep -F $'\r' application.log
Alternatively, use printf
, or echo
, for POSIX compatibility
grep -F "$(printf '\r')" application.log
And we can use hexdump
, or less
to see the result:
$ printf "a\rb" | grep -F $'\r' | hexdump -c
0000000 a \r b \n
Regarding the use of $'\r'
and other supported characters, see Bash Manual > ANSI-C Quoting:
Words of the form $'string' are treated specially. The word expands to string, with backslash-escaped characters replaced as specified by the ANSI C standard
grep -n "\*\^\%\Q\&\$\&\^\@\$\&\!\^\@\$\&\^\&\^\&\^\&" test.log
1:*^%Q&$&^@$&!^@$&^&^&^&
8:*^%Q&$&^@$&!^@$&^&^&^&
14:*^%Q&$&^@$&!^@$&^&^&^&
You could try removing any alphanumeric characters and space. And then use -n
will give you the line number. Try following:
grep -vn "^[a-zA-Z0-9 ]*$" application.log
Try vi with the -b option, this will show special end of line characters
(I typically use it to see windows line endings in a txt file on a unix OS)
But if you want a scripted solution obviously vi wont work so you can try the -f or -e options with grep and pipe the result into sed or awk.
From grep man page:
Matcher Selection
-E, --extended-regexp
Interpret PATTERN as an extended regular expression (ERE, see below). (-E is specified by POSIX.)
-F, --fixed-strings
Interpret PATTERN as a list of fixed strings, separated by newlines, any of which is to be matched. (-F is specified
by POSIX.)