Microsoft DOS findstr command
Quick links
About findstr
Availability
Syntax
Examples
About findstr
The findstr command is short for find string and is a command used in MS-DOS to locate files containing a specific string of plain text.
Microsoft Windows
and MS-DOS users who do not have the operating systems listed on the right column will need to use the find command.
Availability
The findstr.exe command is an external command that is available in the below Microsoft operating systems.
Windows 2000
Windows ME
Windows XP
Windows Vista
Windows 7
Syntax
Searches for strings in files.
| FINDSTR |
[/B] [/E] [/L] [/R] [/S] [/I] [/X] [/V] [/N] [/M] [/O] [/P] [/F:file]
[/C:string] [/G:file] [/D:dir list] [/A:color attributes]
[strings] [[drive:][path]filename[ ...]] |
| /B |
Matches pattern if at the beginning of a line. |
| /E |
Matches pattern if at the end of a line. |
| /L |
Uses search strings literally. |
| /R |
Uses search strings as regular expressions. |
| /S |
Searches for matching files in the current directory and all subdirectories. |
| /I |
Specifies that the search is not to be case-sensitive. |
| /X |
Prints lines that match exactly. |
| /V |
Prints only lines that do not contain a match. |
| /N |
Prints the line number before each line that matches. |
| /M |
Prints only the filename if a file contains a match. |
| /O |
Prints character offset before each matching line. |
| /P |
Skip files with non-printable characters. |
| /A:attr |
Specifies color attribute with two hex digits. See "color /?" |
| /F:file |
Reads file list from the specified file(/ stands for console). |
| /C:string |
Uses specified string as a literal search string. |
| /G:file |
Gets search strings from the specified file(/ stands for console). |
| /D:dir |
Search a semicolon delimited list of directories |
| strings |
Text to be searched for. |
[drive:]
[path:]
filename |
Specifies a file or files to search. |
Use spaces to separate multiple search strings unless the argument is prefixed with /C. For example, 'FINDSTR "hello there" x.y' searches for "hello" or "there" in file x.y. 'FINDSTR /C:"hello there" x.y' searches for "hello there" in file x.y.
Regular expression quick reference:
| . |
Wildcard: any character |
| * |
Repeat: zero or more occurrences of previous character or class |
| ^ |
Line position: beginning of line |
| $ |
Line position: end of line |
| [class] |
Character class: any one character in set |
| [^class] |
Inverse class: any one character not in set |
| [x-z] |
Range: any characters within the specified range |
| \x |
Escape: literal use of metacharacter x |
| \<xyz |
Word position: beginning of word |
| xyz\> |
Word position: end of word |
Examples
findstr "shine tutorial" myfile.txt
In the above example, any lines containing "shine tutorial" would be printed to the screen.
findstr /s "shine tutorial" *.txt
Similar to the first example, the above example would find any lines containing "shine tutorial" in any txt file in the current directory and all sub directories
findstr /x /c:"shine tutorial" *.txt
Match .txt files that contain an exact match on "shine tutorial"; therefore, files that contain "shine tutorials" or other non-exact matches will not be displayed. It is important to realize that using /x must be a line that exactly matches "shine tutorial"; in other words, if anything else is on the same line, it's not an exact match.
findstr /n /i /c:"shine tutorial" *
Search for any file containing "shine tutorial" regardless of its case and display the line where the text is found.
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