Windows OS

What are Good grep Tools for Windows

grep” is a Unix and Linux-based command line utility that originated in the 1970s. Sometimes, Windows users also want to find text, but unfortunately, they do not remember the file name. For this purpose, the grep tools are used to find file names or strings based on provided regular expressions. Many grep tools are available for Windows operating systems that can be utilized without hassle.

This article will discuss different good grep tools for the Windows system.

What are Good grep Tools for Windows?

Windows Operating system has multiple good grep tools using which a user can easily find the file and a string from the extensive amount of files and folders with the help of the specified regular expression.

Have a look at below mentioned the list of good grep tools for Windows:

Let’s go through the listed grep tools one by one!

1. AstroGrep Tool for Windows

AstroGrep is one of the famous open source and freely available Microsoft Windows Grep tools based on GUI. The AstroGrep is developed in Microsoft C# using .Net v4.0. It offers customizable printing options, maintains and retains the most recently used addresses, and supports regular expressions.

Features of AstroGrep

Check out the given list of AstroGrep tool features:

  • It uses standard Microsoft .Net Regular Expressions.
  • It matches the whole word and provides a summary of the results.
  • It can search directories recursively.
  • It provides a context feature.
  • It can print or save all results.

2. BareGrep Tool for Windows

BareGrep is a free text searching and file finding GUI grep tool used to find plain text files and binaries files. It is distributed using a single text executable file. On Windows, BareGrep can also be utilized as a command line utility. To do so, it is required to add the executable file location into the PATH environment variable. You can also utilize the BareGrepPro version on a subscription basis.

Features of BareGrep

Here, we have enlisted the top features of the BareGrep Windows tool:

  • It searches based on regular expressions.
  • It represents search results in tabular form.
  • It supports multiple formats to copy and export results.
  • It provides interactive and incremental search.
  • It can search directories recursively.

3. GrepWin Tool for Windows

GrepWin is a free open source GUI-based tool used to search and replace strings. For this purpose, it uses regular expressions. Grep win is licensed under the GPL( General purpose License), and its source code is available; anyone can use and modify it.

Features of GrepWin

The primary features of the GrepWin Windows tool are as follows:

  • It uses Regular Expressions to search and replace text.
  • It provides a pre-set list where the most used regular expressions are stored.
  • It supports many command line parameters.
  • It can integrate GrepWin with Visual Studio.

4. dnGrep Tool for Windows

dnGrep is a GUI-based open source search and replace tool. It performs a search using regular expressions, text, and phonetic queries. It is designed to more effectively find files, Regex, XPath, and search via PDFs, Word documents, text files, and archives. The User Interface (UI) of this application is simple and easy to understand.

Features of dnGrep

Have a look at the following features of the dnGrep Windows tool:

  • It can perform a search and replaces using phonetics, plain text, or regular expressions.
  • It provides many search filters.
  • It can copy, move and delete results.
  • It utilizes the test Windows to search complex results.
  • This application is translated into multiple languages.

5. PowerGrep Tool for Windows

PowerGrep is a subscription-based search and replacement tool. This application can quickly search the required string or file from an extensive amount of folders and files using regular expressions and literal text. It is an efficient grep tool.

Features of PowerGrep

The list of the primary features of the PowerGrep Windows tool is given below:

  • It can search strings using literal text and regular expressions.
  • This application merges splits and rearranges datasets and logs.
  • It provides backup and history.
  • It can rename, move, copy, compress and decompress files and folders.

Conclusion

There are multiple goods greps tools available for the Windows Operating system, such as AstroGrep, BareGrep, GrepWin, dnGrep, PowerGrep, Windows Grep, and many more. These grep tools are used to find strings and files using plain text or regular expressions, and each of them has some valuable features that differentiate them from others. We have discussed the most popular grep tools for Windows in this article.

About the author

Rafia Zafar

I am graduated in computer science. I am a junior technical author here and passionate about Programming and learning new technologies. I have worked in JAVA, HTML 5, CSS3, Bootstrap, and PHP.