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It should be noted that "faster" is due to the fact that it limits itself to searching the subset of files that have code extensions.

I've tested grep against ack and ag for large text files and grep won handily, especially the latest version of grep.

Also note you can use GNU Parallel to run multiple greps



Yeah, I think it's important not to throw grep away. Ack is really for when you don't know or can't be bothered to explicitly mention the (several) specific files to search.


> I think it's important not to throw grep away

Exactly. There's no reason that you can't have grep AND ack AND ag in your toolbox to choose from.


Sure, there's no reason, but it still sucks to have 3 tools for essentially the same task due to defects in each.


Can you elaborate on these defects


Right, and grep lets you filter files by extensions so there's really no reason to use ack or ag...

alias ack="grep --include=*.c"




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