Using ack

While developing my first MEAN.io app, I've found that I need to use grep alot.

The MEAN framework creates lots of files in separate directories. When you have a complicated project that uses a lot of modules and custom packages, keeping things organized is a necessity. However, as a newcomer, I am having a lot of trouble finding code.

To help alleviate the pain of tracking down code within the MEAN framework, I started using ack, which is supposed to be a version of grep that is optimized for programmers. I wonder how many non-programmers use grep? Anyway, here are a few optimizations that I noticed:

• It defaults to recursive searching (very important for frameworks that bury files in folders).
  So you use ack instead of grep -r .
• Results are returned with the search phrase highlighted in colors. However, if you try to pipe your ack results into another unix command like less, you'll lose that formatting.
• Syntax for adding custom flags seems more intuitive.
  Ex: searching for the word "debugger" in js files can be done like this:
  ack debugger --type=js

While ack certainly seems better than grep, I'm reluctant to completely abandon grep. Many times I need to log onto a bare-bones machine where ack might not be installed. On many of those machines, I don't even have access to the other flavors of grep like egrep or fgrep. In those cases, I'd have to remember how to use plain old vanilla grep again.