GNU bug report logs - #65722
Bug in your grep tool

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Message #5 received at submit <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Eduard Mironenko <edouard.mironenko <at> gmail.com>
To: bug-grep <at> gnu.org
Subject: Bug in your grep tool
Date: Sun, 3 Sep 2023 19:36:54 +0100

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Hi,

I used grep tool to find a simple keyword in one of my repositories but the
tool could not find anything:

[image: image.png]
But the repository does contain a file with the specific keyword:

[image: image.png]
[image: image.png]

Is there something wrong with grep like a bug that needs to be fixed? I
checked the usage page for a macbook:


[image: image.png]

[image: image.png]

[image: image.png]


 it seems to be correct so what gives about this error?


Regards


Edd

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Message #8 received at 65722 <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Seth David Schoen <schoen <at> loyalty.org>
To: Eduard Mironenko <edouard.mironenko <at> gmail.com>
Cc: 65722 <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: bug#65722: Bug in your grep tool
Date: Sun, 3 Sep 2023 21:51:22 -0700

Eduard Mironenko writes:

> Hi,
> 
> I used grep tool to find a simple keyword in one of my repositories but the
> tool could not find anything:

Hi Eduard,

You submitted this bug to the GNU grep project, but based on your man
page excerpt, the version of grep on your system is not actually GNU
grep, but rather some form of BSD grep (a different implementation with
a different code base).  If you're on macOS, many of the system utilities
won't be GNU versions by default; macOS is more heavily based on BSD
systems, and Apple isn't fond of the software licenses used by the
GNU project.

If you have GNU grep, you can tell by running a command like

$ grep --version
grep (GNU grep) 3.4
Copyright (C) 2020 Free Software Foundation, Inc.

I don't think the volunteers here will be able to solve a problem with
a different grep implementation -- definitely not in case the problem
is really a bug in a different version of grep.

The BSD grep implementation does understand -r and -l in the same way
as the GNU implementation, so something like your command should work.

It would be helpful to have copy-and-pasted textual output in your
submission instead of screenshot images.  The screenshots don't
confirm whether you might have accidentally typed a lookalike character
(like 1 instead of l) in your search pattern, or whether there might be
some other character that isn't interpreted as it appears (like somehow
accidentally typing Cyrillic а instead of ASCII a, or any other pair
of characters that may appear visually identical but be interpreted
differently by your computer).

Message #13 received at 65722-done <at> debbugs.gnu.org (full text, mbox):

From: Paul Eggert <eggert <at> cs.ucla.edu>
To: Seth David Schoen <schoen <at> loyalty.org>,
 Eduard Mironenko <edouard.mironenko <at> gmail.com>
Cc: 65722-done <at> debbugs.gnu.org
Subject: Re: bug#65722: Bug in your grep tool
Date: Sun, 3 Sep 2023 23:16:56 -0700

On 2023-09-03 21:51, Seth David Schoen wrote:
> You submitted this bug to the GNU grep project, but based on your man
> page excerpt, the version of grep on your system is not actually GNU
> grep, but rather some form of BSD grep (a different implementation with
> a different code base).

Thanks for following up. With the understanding that this bug report is 
not about GNU grep, I'm closing the bug report. We can reopen it later 
if I'm wrong.



> It would be helpful to have copy-and-pasted textual output in your
> submission instead of screenshot images.  The screenshots don't
> confirm whether you might have accidentally typed a lookalike character

Yes, plus people like me whose email clients render only text don't see 
the screenshots.

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