Specify ignore custom file patterns in .ackrc

Question

I have certain CSS files of fileName *-c.css and *-gen.css which I want to ignore from ack-grep searches.

I see that --type-set=TYPENAME=.extension does not accept regex filters like *-c.css, any idea of how to get around this problem ?

Hawkes

Answer 1

I came across ack-grep 2.0 which provides --ignore-file option based on regex pattern as below and it worked after adding it to ~/.ackrc.

--ignore-file=match:-c.js
--ignore-file=match:-gen.js
--ignore-file=match:-c.css
--ignore-file=match:-gen.css

Hawkes

for exact file names: --ignore-file=is:<filename> - for ctags file: --ignore-file=is:tags – Councilwoman

Filters for different uses can be found on beyondgrep.com/documentation/… – Councilwoman

For all the too-fast readers finding this: Note that the '-' in the match string above is not saying "remove c.js files" - the '-' is part of the file name in the original question! – Surge

Answer 2

Use a regular expression to filter those files you want to search.

ack -G '(?<!-c)(?<!-gen)\.css$' expression_to_search

It uses the perl flavour. I do a negative look-behind to skip those that contain -c or -gen just before the extension.

Hick

For those reading this in 2019 or beyond, ack 3.x doesn't support the -G option. You have to use ack -g pattern | ack -x expression_to_search. – Elissaelita