Find text string in *.txt file and include line above plus 2 lines below

You know, I believe you have refreshed my memory of where I recall a program able to do this.  While at college studying for an in-between certificate in computing, we had to learn some old Unix and C Programming.  We used the GREP command frequently, and I believe that is where my hazy recollections stem from.

I will look for a Windows *.exe and test it out.

Thank you.

Here's a batch file you can try.

SETLOCAL ENABLEDELAYEDEXPANSION
Set linesb4=1
Set linesafter=2
 
 
Set /a Totallines=1+%linesb4%+%Linesafter%
 
for %%a in ("*.txt") do for /f "Tokens=1 delims=[]" %%b in ('type "%%a" ^| find /n "***"') do (
    Set /a Sk=%%b-%Linesb4%-1
    CALL :GetLines "%%a" "%%~na_Markers.txt" !Sk! %Totallines%
)
GOTO :EOF
:GetLines
 
Set line=1
if %3 LSS 1 (
    for /f "tokens=*" %%c in ('type %1') do (
        if !line! leq %4 echo %%c>>%2
        Set /a line+=1
    )
) ELSE (
    for /f "skip=%3 delims=" %%c in ('type %1') do (
        if !line! leq %4 echo %%c>>%2
        Set /a line+=1
    )
)
                                              

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Thank you for that AmazingTech.

It's good to see a pure batch option.  I have tested it with a single *.txt file in the same folder. I'm not sure whether it ran as intended, but it paused at each pass for about 30 to 40 seconds and then continued parsing for what seemed like ages.  After about 3 and a half or 4 minutes I Ctrl + C'd it and inspected the output file.  It had only found 3 separate *** lines plus the line above and two below after that time.  The results when I stopped the batch file had found the *** (and accompanying) lines down to line 260 of the source file.   My fear would be that scanning its way repeatedly through 20,473 lines of text in one text file would take an absolute eternity.

It obviously WORKS as intended (ie. yields the intended results), and your use of batch programming is very clever indeed to have devised that, but do you think it is actually RUNNING as you intended?

I had no doubt that such a process written purely as a batch file would certainly be quite intensive, but I'm not sure whether your solution will be usable for what I need it to do, ie. scan several hundred text files.  If that is the way it must work to do the job, then that would be a pity :-( ... but will certainly be worthy of points for a batch file that works :-)

I have had the chance to check out an Open Source and Freeware version of GREP for 32-bit Windows, and it does work pretty well for what I need.  It's by no means fast either, and I don't know how it would fare with more than one text file, but it seems to be a more immediately usable solution.

You know, I've used the /n switch with the FIND command and a few others like FC a few times before, but forgot about it here.

Thanks again.

I will attach a sample *.txt file that I used to test the batch file.

The above solution would take a long time since every match it has to go through the text file again each time.

I had some sleep and I thought of another way which would be faster than the one above. The only draw back to this new method would be:

Only 1 line above the searched string. (I think it can be changed)

I don't have time right now to script and post it. I need to drop the kids at school.

I'm very grateful for the attention you have paid, and are offering to pay, to my question, but it is not so urgent as to get in the way of your commitments.  Whenever (and if ever) you get the time would be excellent.  Thanks.

Wow!

@echo off
set speechless=Amazing
set expert=Tech
set gratitude=Thank You
set Skill_Level=%speechless%
echo %gratitude% %speechless%%expert%, you are truly %Skill_Level%
pause > nul
exit

Your time and knowledge are very much appreciated.  That batch file whistles by about as fast as can be hoped for with a pure batch file.

Thank you also Superdave, you gave me a very valid and useful option not only for immediate use but for other ideas I have brewing.

Bill