This is the built-in help made by Microsoft for the command 'Select-String', in PowerShell version 2 - as retrieved from
Windows version 'Microsoft® Windows Vista™ Ultimate ' PowerShell help files on 2016-06-23.
For PowerShell version 3 and up, where you have Update-Help, this command was run just before creating the web pages from the help files.
Finds text in strings and files.
Select-String [-Path] <string[]> [-Pattern] <string[]> [-AllMatches] [-CaseSensitive] [-Context <Int32[]>] [-Encoding <string>] [-Exclude <string
[]>] [-Include <string[]>] [-List] [-NotMatch] [-Quiet] [-SimpleMatch] [<CommonParameters>]
Select-String -InputObject <psobject> [-Pattern] <string[]> [-AllMatches] [-CaseSensitive] [-Context <Int32[]>] [-Encoding <string>] [-Exclude <s
tring[]>] [-Include <string[]>] [-List] [-NotMatch] [-Quiet] [-SimpleMatch] [<CommonParameters>]
The Select-String cmdlet searches for text and text patterns in input strings and files. You can use it like Grep in UNIX and Findstr in Windows.
Select-String is based on lines of text. By default, Select-String finds the first match in each line and, for each match, it displays the file n
ame, line number, and all text in the line containing the match.
However, you can direct it to detect multiple matches per line, display text before and after the match, or display only a Boolean value (true or
false) that indicates whether a match is found.
Select-String uses regular expression matching, but it can also perform a simple match that searches the input for the text that you specify.
Select-String can display all of the text matches or stop after the first match in each input file. It can also display all text that does not ma
tch the specified pattern.
You can also specify that Select-String should expect a particular character encoding, such as when you are searching files of Unicode text.
<
Online version: http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=113388
about_Comparison_Operators
about_Regular_Expressions
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-------------------------- EXAMPLE 1 --------------------------
C:\PS>"Hello","HELLO" | select-string -pattern "HELLO" -casesensitive
Description
-----------
This command performs a case-sensitive match of the text that was piped to the Select-String command.
As a result, Select-String finds only "HELLO", because "Hello" does not match.
Because each of the quoted strings is treated as a line, without the CaseSensitive parameter, Select-String would recognize both of the strings a
s matches.
-------------------------- EXAMPLE 2 --------------------------
C:\PS>select-string -path *.xml -pattern "the the"
Description
-----------
This command searches through all files with the .xml file name extension in the current directory and displays the lines in those files that inc
lude the string "the the".
-------------------------- EXAMPLE 3 --------------------------
C:\PS>select-string -path $pshome\en-US\*.txt -pattern "@"
Description
-----------
This command searches the Windows PowerShell conceptual Help files (about_*.txt) for information about the use of the at sign (@).
To indicate the path, this command uses the value of the $pshome automatic variable, which stores the path to the Windows PowerShell installation
directory. In this example, the command searches the en-US subdirectory, which contains the English (US) language Help files for Windows PowerSh
ell.
-------------------------- EXAMPLE 4 --------------------------
C:\PS>function search-help
{
$pshelp = "$pshome\es\about_*.txt", "$pshome\en-US\*dll-help.xml"
select-string -path $pshelp -pattern $args[0]
}
Description
-----------
This simple function uses the Select-String cmdlet to search the Windows PowerShell Help files for a particular string. In this example, the func
tion searches the "en-US" subdirectory for English-United States language files.
To use the function to find a string, such as "psdrive", type "search-help psdrive".
To use this function in any Windows PowerShell console, change the path to point to the Windows PowerShell Help files on your system, and then pa
ste the function in your Windows PowerShell profile.
-------------------------- EXAMPLE 5 --------------------------
C:\PS>$events = get-eventlog -logname application -newest 100
C:\PS> $events | select-string -inputobject {$_.message} -pattern "failed"
Description
-----------
This example searches for the string "failed" in the 100 newest events in the Application log in Event Viewer.
The first command uses the Get-EventLog cmdlet to get the 100 most recent events from the Application event log. Then it stores the events in the
$events variable.
The second command uses a pipeline operator (|) to send the objects in the $events variable to Select-String. It uses the InputObject parameter t
o represent the input from the $events variable. The value of the InputObject parameter is the Message property of each object as it travels thro
ugh the pipeline. The current object is represented by the $_ symbol.
As each event arrives in the pipeline, Select-String searches the value of its Message property for the "failed" string, and then displays any li
nes that include a match.
-------------------------- EXAMPLE 6 --------------------------
C:\PS>get-childitem c:\windows\system32\* -include *.txt -recurse |
select-string -pattern "Microsoft" -casesensitive
Description
-----------
This command examines all files in the subdirectories of C:\Windows\System32 with the .txt file name extension and searches for the string "Micro
soft". The CaseSensitive parameter indicates that the "M" in "Microsoft" must be capitalized and that the rest of the characters must be lowercas
e for Select-String to find a match.
-------------------------- EXAMPLE 7 --------------------------
C:\PS>select-string -path process.txt -pattern idle, svchost -notmatch
Description
-----------
This command finds lines of text in the Process.txt file that do not include the words "idle" or "svchost".
-------------------------- EXAMPLE 8 --------------------------
C:\PS>$f = select-string -path audit.log -pattern "logon failed" -context 2, 3
C:\PS> $f.count
C:\PS> ($f)[0].context | format-list
Description
-----------
The first command searches the Audit.Log file for the phrase "logon failed." It uses the Context parameter to capture 2 lines before the match an
d 3 lines after the match.
The second command uses the Count property of object arrays to display the number of matches found, in this case, 2.
The third command displays the lines stored in the Context property of the first MatchInfo object. It uses array notation to indicate the first m
atch (match 0 in a zero-based array), and it uses the Format-List cmdlet to display the value of the Context property as a list.
The output consists of two MatchInfo objects, one for each match detected. The context lines are stored in the Context property of the MatchInfo
object.
-------------------------- EXAMPLE 9 --------------------------
C:\PS>$a = get-childitem $pshome\en-us\about*.help.txt | select-string -pattern transcript
C:\PS> $b = get-childitem $pshome\en-us\about*.help.txt | select-string -pattern transcript -allmatches
C:\PS> $a
C:\Windows\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\en-us\about_Pssnapins.help.txt:39: Start-Transcript and Stop-Transcript.
C:\PS> $b
C:\Windows\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\en-us\about_Pssnapins.help.txt:39: Start-Transcript and Stop-Transcript.
C:\PS>> $a.matches
Groups : {Transcript}
Success : True
Captures : {Transcript}
Index : 13
Length : 10
Value : Transcript
C:\PS> $b.matches
Groups : {Transcript}
Success : True
Captures : {Transcript}
Index : 13
Length : 10
Value : Transcript
Groups : {Transcript}
Success : True
Captures : {Transcript}
Index : 33
Length : 10
Value : Transcript
Description
-----------
This example demonstrates the effect of the AllMatches parameter of Select-String. AllMatches finds all pattern matches in a line, instead of jus
t finding the first match in each line.
The first command in the example searches the Windows PowerShell conceptual Help files ("about" Help) for instances of the word "transcript". The
second command is identical, except that it uses the AllMatches parameter.
The output of the first command is saved in the $a variable. The output of the second command is saved in the $b variable.
When you display the value of the variables, the default display is identical, as shown in the example output.
However, the fifth and sixth commands display the value of the Matches property of each object. The Matches property of the first command contain
s just one match (that is, one System.Text.RegularExpressions.Match object), whereas the Matches property of the second command contains objects
for both of the matches in the line.