Path: utzoo!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!mailrus!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!virtech!cpcahil
From: cpcahil@virtech.UUCP (Conor P. Cahill)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.wizards
Subject: Re: Look!  An xargs!! (Re: recursive grep)
Message-ID: <1122@virtech.UUCP>
Date: 3 Sep 89 15:23:30 GMT
References: <666@lakart.UUCP> <1641@cbnewsl.ATT.COM> <7774@cbmvax.UUCP> <4026@buengc.BU.EDU>
Organization: Virtual Technologies Inc
Lines: 32

In article <4026@buengc.BU.EDU>, bph@buengc.BU.EDU (Blair P. Houghton) writes:
> Okay, kids.  Shell script 101 is now in session.
> 
> Try this, after putting  it in a file and turning on the execute flag.
> 
>     while read arrrrg
>     do
> 	    $* $arrrrg
>     done
> 

The reason why xargs was suggested was so the following type of operation
could be executed without fork/execing a grep for every file.

	find . [args] -print -exec grep [RE] {} ";"

Xargs will use the following structure AND process as many files
as it can in a single iteration:

	find . [args] -print | xargs grep [RE]

So your solution would be somewhat less effecient than using the 
find to exec the grep itself, since you would require a pipe,
a shell, and then the fork/exec FOR every file.



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| Conor P. Cahill     uunet!virtech!cpcahil      	703-430-9247	!
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