grep is the established tool for full-text file search on the command line. But alternatives are available, like ripgrep, ag, and sift. But should you switch and, if so, which should be your search ...

The setup: I have a directory. In this directory is a series of subdirectories. In each subdirectory are four or five text files. The files are all named identically from directory to directory; i.e.

title pretty much says it all... how can i grep out a string from a bunch of files/subdirectories and also get the filename in which the string is contained?

The essential command for searching for strings on the Linux command line is 'grep'. However, the weakness of grep is that it cannot search for character strings in video files and PDF files. ' ...