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How do you escape characters in grep?
If you include special characters in patterns typed on the command line, escape them by enclosing them in single quotation marks to prevent inadvertent misinterpretation by the shell or command interpreter. To match a character that is special to grep –E, put a backslash ( \ ) in front of the character.
Which way is backslash?
A good way to remember the difference between a backslash and a forward slash is that a backslash leans backwards ( \ ), while a forward slash leans forward ( / ). In Windows, backslashes are used to separate directories in file paths (ex: C:\Program Files\Common Files\microsoft shared\).
Does a backslash MEAN AND or OR?
While the backslash is a specialist, the forward slash is a Jack-of-all-trades. Its most common use is to mean “or” when presenting two alternatives: The slash here shows that either word could apply. However, you should avoid doing this too often in formal writing, where “or” is a better choice.
Is there a special character for backslash in grep?
(Above, I used printf instead of echo as many echo implementations also do their own interpreting of backslash (here would expand \\b into a backspace character)). But backslash is also a special character for grep.
What are the escape characters in grep Stack Overflow?
Within double quotes, backslashes that are followed by one of these characters are removed. grep -e”def|zzz” – grep receives def|zzz; because it defaults to basic regular expressions (BRE), | isn’t special 1 and grep tries to match the literal string def|zzz.
When to use upper or lowercase e in grep?
I suspect grep itself does something special with the literal string \\\\|. The lowercase -e option is used to express multiple search operations. The alternation is implied: Alternatively, you can use the upper -E option for extended regular expression notation:
How to use grep with double quotes in shell?
By the way, for the shell, single quotes ‘…’ prevent any kind of character interpretation, but double quotes only prevents some of them: in particular $, ` and \\ remain active characters within “…”. You can also use fgrep (which is just grep with the -F flag).