ack: Exclude search directories via regex - from Stack Overflow

OK, the hints shown at the bottom worked pretty well for me.  I wanted to find a certain string in C source files, but not be distracted by compiled release directories named "rel*".  I guessed at which wildcard syntax ack supports, and I think I won:

(cd ~/Work/mse1/compiler; ack -G 'rel*' --invert-file-match --type=cc -- "builtin_object_size" )

YMMV.  No warranties expressed or implied.  Thank god for undocumented/lightly documented features...  ;-)
Cheers,
Connie
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Stack Overflow:
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How do I ignore specific directories via RegEx with ack? I can use the --ignore-dir option, but this does not let me specify a RegEx. I want to be able to ignore any directory, which has the words test or tests or more complicated patterns in its name. I also tried a negative lookbehind via ack -G '(? pattern but this does not work. It does not exclude the test directories. regex ack share|edit asked Dec 29 '11 at 15:35 cschol 4,38042343 86% accept rate

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Use the undocumented option "--invert-file-match" (ack version on my system: 1.96): $ ack pattern -G 'test|tests' --invert-file-match Well, it is sort of documented: $ ack --help|grep invert-v, --invert-match    Invert match: select non-matching lines--invert-file-match   Print/search handle files that do not match -g/-G. It is not documented in its perldoc. share|edit answered Dec 29 '11 at 16:31 holygeek 4,133511

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