Table of Contents Tip 109: Customize the grep Program Vim's Default grep Settings References: References: Make `:grep` Call ack Make ack Jump to Line and Column Alternative grep Plugins

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• 'grepprg' setting specifies what to run in the shell when Vim's `:grep` command is executed.

• 'grepformat' setting tells Vim how to parse the output returned by the `:grep` command.

• Default settings on Unix systems:

* The $* symbol used in the 'grepprg' setting is a placeholder, which is replaced with any arguments supplied to the :grep command. * The special tokens used in the 'grepformat' string are the same as those used by 'errorformat'.

* `%f` matches the filename * `%l` matches the line number * `%m` matches the text on that line

• `%c` matches the column number

• grep uses POSIX regular expressions, whereas ack uses Perl regular expressions.
• ack.vim and fugitive.vim create custom commands rather than overriding the :grep command, they can all coexist without conflict.