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How to search a directory recursively for specific files containing a text string in linux / unix

Hello,

I would like a command to search a directory recursivly for all .txt files containing the string "string". I have tried to accomplish this using grep, but it is searching more than just .txt files. Here is the command I have tried, but its not working correctly:

grep -lr "string" /root/volumes/ *txt

icenick

Hello,

I would go first for "find".

I would search the files with the command find and then use xargs to grep the string you want.

I attached a code snippet.

Good Luck!

find /path/ -type f -name "*.txt" | xargs grep "string"

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Gerwin Jansen

Hi, I use a script called "mgrep" for this:

for a in `find . -type f`; do file -bi $a | grep "^text" 2>&1 >/dev/null && grep -l "$1" $a; done;

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Searches from current folder in all subfolders for string given as a parameter, like this:

mgrep <string>

It will print all text files that match

Tintin

Problem is the space, so your grep is searching

/root/volumes AND *txt

should be

grep -lr "string" /root/volumes/*txt

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hvillanu

Hi,
Try
#grep -i string */*.txt

If you want to put the results on a file add >myoutput.log at the end of the command...

#grep -i string */*.txt>myoutput.log

-hope helps-

Kamaraj Subramanian

find . -type f | xargs grep -l "string"

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simon3270

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simon3270

Thanks for the points!

By the way, a version of the second command which handles filenames with spaces in is:

find /root/volumes -type f -print0 | xargs -0 file | awk -F: '$2 ~ /text/{printf "%s%c",$1,0}' | xargs -0 grep "string" /dev/null

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