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Development Tools Console Foundations Environment and Redirection Pipes and Redirection

Posted by Jess Claussen
Jess Claussen
6,078 Points

How does grep know what file to look in when we do not specify a file?

Does its search limit to the current directory? would it search all the files in that directory? And could I use it to search files in another directory?

2 Answers

Ken Alger
STAFF
Ken Alger
Treehouse Teacher
Ken Alger
Ken Alger
Treehouse Teacher

Jess;

I guess I don't fully understand your question. When you don't pass grep a file name it "looks" for input elsewhere, for example from the standard input (keyboard) as is shown in the course video around the 2:05 time mark.

Is that what you are asking?

In terms of reading files in other directories, grep will search wherever you point it in the format:

$ grep (search term) (file name)

So, if you wanted to search for a file name outside your current directory, you would just point it there.

Make any sense?

Ken

Pavlo Kochubei
Pavlo Kochubei
15,009 Points
Pavlo Kochubei
Pavlo Kochubei
15,009 Points

At 2:40, the instructor types in the following:

$ grep hello

I guess, the first question was referring to this instance