Path: utzoo!attcan!utgpu!jarvis.csri.toronto.edu!rutgers!tut.cis.ohio-state.edu!ucbvax!hplabs!hpfcdc!hpfcdq!benji
From: benji@hpfcdq.HP.COM (Jeff Benjamin)
Newsgroups: comp.unix.questions
Subject: Re: Expansion of the acronym "grep"
Message-ID: <8170003@hpfcdq.HP.COM>
Date: 5 Jun 89 17:26:34 GMT
References: <25249@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>
Organization: Hewlett-Packard - Fort Collins, CO
Lines: 14

> What is the correct expansion of the acronym "grep"? I'm told that this
> has come up in comp.unix.questions before, but the relevant articles are
> no longer on my news server. I'd also be interested in knowing what the
> acronyms for the other flavors of grep (e.g. egrp) expand to.

I have heard that "grep" stands for "general regular expression parser."
"Egrep," then, might be "extended grep", and "fgrep" might be "fast
grep."  Note that if this is the correct acronym for fgrep, it is a
misnomer, since fgrep doesn't do regular expressions -- only strings.

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Jeff Benjamin                         {ucbvax,hplabs}!hpfcla!benji
Graphics Technology Division          benji%hpfcla@hplabs.HP.COM
Hewlett Packard Co.                   Fort Collins, Colorado