CODEWITHSUNDEEP
unixsearchgrepspecial-characters
SteveP
SteveP

Reputation: 11

How to grep to (not) match the special character "/" (no quotes) at the end each line

I want to grep through a large file for lines not ending in "/" (no quotes). Here is a sample file: 

Folder1/clicker7Mac/
Folder1/clicker7Mac/clicker7.17.0_Mac/Resources/
Folder2/
Folder2/file of interest1.pdf
Folder2/Grades/
Folder2/Grades/another file of interest.pdf
Folder2/Grades/other files with unknown but not-slash extension
Folder2/Final_exam/
Folder2/Final_exam/a 3rd file.pdf
Folder2/Grades/an excel file of interest.xlsx
Folder2/Grades/Package_for_someone/
Folder2/HW/
Folder2/HW/HW1/

I want only the lines ending in files, not the lines that are directory paths. I.e. here I want output:

Folder2/file of interest1.pdf
Folder2/Grades/another file of interest.pdf
Folder2/Grades/other files with unknown but not-slash extension
Folder2/Final_exam/a 3rd file.pdf
Folder2/Grades/an excel file of interest.xlsx

I've searched stack exchange and unix forums and have tried the following (note I have inverted the search because it's easier to test): 

grep  '.*/' testfile
grep  '\w*/\b' testfile

(greps all words and slashes, takes files as well; grep -v yeilds nothing)

grep  "[a-z.0-9]"'/\b' testfile

(last character before all slashes; grep -v yeilds nothing)

grep  '\l*/\b' testfile
grep  '\>/' testfile

(all slashes (not just the end slash); grep -v yeilds nothing)

grep -F  '/\b' testfile

(fgrep or grep -F treats as literal string and yeilds nothing; grep -v yeilds everything)

Any solutions please?

Upvotes: 1

Views: 148

Answers (3)

Jotne
Jotne

Reputation: 41460

If awk is an option:

awk -F'/' '$NF' file
Folder2/file of interest1.pdf
Folder2/Grades/another file of interest.pdf
Folder2/Grades/other files with unknown but not-slash extension
Folder2/Final_exam/a 3rd file.pdf
Folder2/Grades/an excel file of interest.xlsx

It sets the Field Separator to / and then test if last field contains some thing and then do default action, print the line.

Another variation more like the grep solution, test if line does not end with /:

awk '!/[/]$/' file
Folder2/file of interest1.pdf
Folder2/Grades/another file of interest.pdf
Folder2/Grades/other files with unknown but not-slash extension
Folder2/Final_exam/a 3rd file.pdf
Folder2/Grades/an excel file of interest.xlsx

Upvotes: 1

Arkadiusz Drabczyk
Arkadiusz Drabczyk

Reputation: 12528

Use grep -v to exclude all lines that end with /:

$ grep -v '/$' testfile
Folder2/file of interest1.pdf
Folder2/Grades/another file of interest.pdf
Folder2/Grades/other files with unknown but not-slash extension
Folder2/Final_exam/a 3rd file.pdf
Folder2/Grades/an excel file of interest.xlsx

-v is portable and specified by POSIX.

Upvotes: 1

Cyrus
Cyrus

Reputation: 88879

grep -v '/$' file

or

grep '[^/]$' file

Output:

Folder2/file of interest1.pdf
Folder2/Grades/another file of interest.pdf
Folder2/Grades/other files with unknown but not-slash extension
Folder2/Final_exam/a 3rd file.pdf
Folder2/Grades/an excel file of interest.xlsx

See: man grep and The Stack Overflow Regular Expressions FAQ

Upvotes: 1

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