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Oct 04

Quickly Search Through Text Files

Posted in: Freeware, search, Software, Today's Chili, Windows

This article was written on September 16, 2011 by CyberNet.

Windows only
Programs like Notepad++ are great because they provide powerful text file editing, but the searching can leave something to be desired. Text Filter is an app dedicated to searching through text files and it does a great job of it. It instantly highlights results as you type, and can optionally hide lines that don’t contain any matches.

Once you get past the fact that this is not a file editor you can start enjoying it for the things it’s good at:

Search as you type
Text lines are instantly filtered as you type your search phrase, with all matched terms highlighted in a contrasting color.
Auto suggestion for search phrase
While typing into the search box, the program lists searched phrases for you to choose from. This makes text search easier and faster.
Regular expressions
You can do regex searching by checking Regex Query in Search menu.
Multiple query modes
Besides regex query, you can also do Naive Query and Smart Query. Naive Query lets you search anywhere in the document for the entered text, while Smart Query allows for matches on word boundaries only.
Multiple filter modes
You can choose to hide either matched or unmatched lines for an easier text view. If you prefer viewing the entire document, make sure the option Show All Lines is checked in Search menu.

If you’re looking for a Notepad replacement you’ll have to continue your search since this can’t be used to make changes to files, but if you’re looking for more powerful ways to search through text files this is just the app you need.

Text Filter Homepage (Windows only; Freeware)

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