# Directory searching againist a text file

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/directory-searching-againist-a-text-file/155004>\
**Category:** Ruby\
**Created:** [December 6, 2008, 1:55am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/directory-searching-againist-a-text-file/155004 "2008-12-06T01:55:35Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![sclarke](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/s/b19c9b/32.png) [@sclarke](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/sclarke)\
**Post date:** [December 6, 2008, 1:55am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/directory-searching-againist-a-text-file/155004/1 "2008-12-06T01:55:35Z")

</div>

I am in the middle of writing a quick program which will scan the  
contents of a given file path recursively for a list of keywords stored  
in a file. My code so far is below, but before moving ahead I have two  
questions.

First: I am passing in a text file called “terms.txt” to search for each  
keyword in the file I assume the best way to to do so is as follows:

terms.each do |term|  
if line =~ term  
puts “”  
end

My second question is: This program works well for searching text files  
but what about word docs and spreadsheets? Do i need some Windows API in  
there??

Many thanks

require ‘find’

class ESearch

#method which is passed file path from cmd line  
def scanFiles(path)  
terms = “C:\Documents and Settings\user\Desktop\terms.txt”  
#process each file under the passed file path  
Find.find(path) do |curPath|  
next unless File.file?(curPath)  
#process the contens of each file line by line counting line  
nmbers  
File.open(curPath) do |file|  
file.each do |line|  
#check if a line in the file matches term and output the path  
and line number  
if line =~ terms  
puts “#{curPath}”  
end  
end  
end  
end  
end  
end

#run of cmd line pass in file path, this will ask for a file path if one  
is not passed  
if **FILE** == $0  
if ARGV.size != 1  
puts “Use: #{$0} [path]”  
exit  
end

esearch = ESearch.new()  
esearch.scanFiles(ARGV[0])  
end

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![sclarke](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/s/b19c9b/32.png) [@sclarke](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/sclarke)\
**Post date:** [December 6, 2008, 9:41pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/directory-searching-againist-a-text-file/155004/2 "2008-12-06T21:41:35Z")

</div>

Stuart C. wrote:

> if line =~ term  
> puts “”  
> end
> 
> My second question is: This program works well for searching text  
> files but what about word docs and spreadsheets? Do i need some  
> Windows API in there??

You can read these files if you open them in binary mode.  
However, they will contain so much extra binary crap that  
it may not be easy to search in them.

> def scanFiles(path)  
> if line =~ terms  
> if FILE == $0  
> if ARGV.size != 1  
> puts “Use: #{$0} [path]”  
> exit  
> end
> 
> esearch = ESearch.new()  
> esearch.scanFiles(ARGV[0])  
> end

terms = IO.read(“terms.txt”).strip.split(/\s\*\n\s\*/)

ARGF.each{|line| line.strip!  
if terms.include? line  
puts “#{ARGF.filename}:#{ARGF.lineno}: #{line}”  
end  
}

Running it:

ruby scanner.rb \*.dat