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The Silver Searcher Fast code search

Version 2.2.0 · source

The Silver Searcher, Postcard, light preview Light · Postcard 102 × 152 mm · PDF The Silver Searcher, Postcard, dark preview Dark · Postcard 102 × 152 mm · PDF The Silver Searcher, Postcard, ink saver preview Ink saver · Postcard 102 × 152 mm · PDF
The Silver Searcher, A5, light preview Light · A5 148 × 210 mm · PDF The Silver Searcher, A5, dark preview Dark · A5 148 × 210 mm · PDF The Silver Searcher, A5, ink saver preview Ink saver · A5 148 × 210 mm · PDF
The Silver Searcher, A4, light preview Light · A4 210 × 297 mm · PDF The Silver Searcher, A4, dark preview Dark · A4 210 × 297 mm · PDF The Silver Searcher, A4, ink saver preview Ink saver · A4 210 × 297 mm · PDF
The Silver Searcher, A4 landscape, light preview Light · A4 landscape 297 × 210 mm · PDF The Silver Searcher, A4 landscape, dark preview Dark · A4 landscape 297 × 210 mm · PDF The Silver Searcher, A4 landscape, ink saver preview Ink saver · A4 landscape 297 × 210 mm · PDF
The Silver Searcher, A3, light preview Light · A3 297 × 420 mm · PDF The Silver Searcher, A3, dark preview Dark · A3 297 × 420 mm · PDF The Silver Searcher, A3, ink saver preview Ink saver · A3 297 × 420 mm · PDF
The Silver Searcher, A3 landscape, light preview Light · A3 landscape 420 × 297 mm · PDF The Silver Searcher, A3 landscape, dark preview Dark · A3 landscape 420 × 297 mm · PDF The Silver Searcher, A3 landscape, ink saver preview Ink saver · A3 landscape 420 × 297 mm · PDF
The Silver Searcher, Letter, light preview Light · Letter 8.5 × 11 in · PDF The Silver Searcher, Letter, dark preview Dark · Letter 8.5 × 11 in · PDF The Silver Searcher, Letter, ink saver preview Ink saver · Letter 8.5 × 11 in · PDF
The Silver Searcher, Tabloid, light preview Light · Tabloid 11 × 17 in · PDF The Silver Searcher, Tabloid, dark preview Dark · Tabloid 11 × 17 in · PDF The Silver Searcher, Tabloid, ink saver preview Ink saver · Tabloid 11 × 17 in · PDF

Start here

ag <pattern>
Search recursively
ag -i <pattern>
Ignore case
ag -Q <text>
Literal, not regex
ag -G <regex> <pattern>
Only matching file names
ag --<type> <pattern>
Only one file type
ag -C <n> <pattern>
Show context
ag -l <pattern>
List matching files
ag -u <pattern>
Search everything

Concepts

  1. Walk tree from . or <path>
  2. Filter types, -G, hidden
  3. Match PCRE per file
  4. Print path:line:text
What happens to each file

Searching

ag <pattern> [<path>...]
Search paths recursively (default .)
ag -i <pattern>
Case-insensitive
ag -s <pattern>
Case-sensitive
ag -Q <text>
Literal string, no regex
-F is an alias for -Q, kept for grep users.
ag -w <word>
Match whole words only
ag -v <pattern>
Show non-matching lines
ag -o <pattern>
Print only the matched part
ag -m <n> <pattern>
Stop each file after n matches
ag --multiline <pattern>
Let a regex span lines
Multiline matching is already on by default; --nomultiline turns it off.
ag -z <pattern>
Search inside gz and xz files
ag --search-binary <pattern>
Include binary files
ag -f <pattern>
Follow symlinks

Output

ag -l <pattern>
List only names of matching files
ag -L <pattern>
List files without a match
ag -c <pattern>
Count matches per file
Counts matches, not matching lines.
ag --column <pattern>
Show column numbers
ag --vimgrep <pattern>
file:line:col:text for Vim quickfix
ag --nogroup <pattern>
Put the file name on every line
ag --nocolor <pattern>
Plain output without colors
ag -H <pattern>
File name heading above matches
ag --noheading <pattern>
No headings, one line per match
ag -W <n> <pattern>
Truncate long lines after n chars
ag --print-long-lines <pattern>
Show lines over 2k chars
ag --pager '<cmd>' <pattern>
Pipe results through a pager
ag --passthrough <pattern>
Print every line of a piped stream
ag -0 -l <pattern>
NUL-separate file names
Pair with xargs -0 for names with spaces.
ag --stats <pattern>
Print files scanned and time taken

Context

ag -C [<n>] <pattern>
Lines around each match (default 2)
ag -A [<n>] <pattern>
Lines after each match (default 2)
ag -B [<n>] <pattern>
Lines before each match (default 2)
ag --nobreak <pattern>
No blank line between files

Files and Types

ag --<type> <pattern>
Only files of a type, e.g. --python
Use --list-file-types for the supported names.
ag --list-file-types
Show all file type flags
ag -G <regex> <pattern>
Search only files whose name matches
ag -g <regex>
List files whose name matches
ag -l ''
List all files ag would search
An empty query with -l lists every searchable file.
ag --ignore <pattern> <pattern>
Skip files or dirs matching a glob
ag --hidden <pattern>
Include hidden files
Ignore files are still obeyed.
ag -u <pattern>
Ignore all ignore rules, include hidden and binary
ag -U <pattern>
Skip VCS ignores but obey .ignore
ag -t <pattern>
All text files, ignore-file aware
ag -a <pattern>
All files, ignore rules off, hidden excluded
ag -p <file> <pattern>
Use a specific ignore file
ag -n <pattern>
Do not recurse into directories
ag --depth <n> <pattern>
Limit recursion depth (default 25)
ag --one-device <pattern>
Stay on one filesystem
ag --workers <n> <pattern>
Set number of search threads

Regex

ag '<a>|<b>'
Either pattern
ag '^<text>'
Anchor to line start
ag '<text>$'
Anchor to line end
ag '\bword\b'
Word boundaries
ag '\d+'
One or more digits
ag '(?i)<text>'
Inline case-insensitive
ag '<a>(?=<b>)'
Lookahead
ag '\s+$'
Trailing whitespace

Ignore files

Where patterns come from
Source Effect
.gitignore Skipped by default
.hgignore Skipped by default
.ignore ag-only rules, any directory
~/.agignore Global ag-only rules
Project .ignore
# one pattern per linenode_modules*.min.jsbuild/dist/

Recipes

Replace across files
ag -l --null 'oldName' | xargs -0 sed -i 's/oldName/newName/g'
Find a definition
ag --python '^\s*def parse_' src/ag -C 3 'TODO|FIXME' --ignore '*.md'
Pick results with fzf
ag --nobreak --noheading . | fzfag -g '\.test\.js$'
Vim integration
# in .vimrclet g:ackprg = 'ag --vimgrep'