Download source files - 978 Kb
Introduction
How many times do you find yourself plowing through files looking for that illusive line of code
whether it is a method declaration, function call, or algorithm etc.? If you're anything like me it's all the time and you may therefore find
this FREE utility, Agent Ransack, very useful.
Agent Ransack searches through files, text or otherwise, fast and
efficiently. When searching the contents of files for code, or other text, Agent Ransack displays
the text found so you can quickly browse the
results without having to separately open each
file!
Basic Example
Shown below is an example of searching for the Format method of CString in
the MFC source directory.
The example shows a few important features:
Regular expressions: The filename field uses a regular expression to
search through all files with a .cpp or .h extension. Regular expressions can be
used in both the file name and the contents field. If you would rather use DOS
style expressions then there is an 'Auto convert to DOS' option. If you are not
familiar with regular expressions but would still like to use them there is an
Expression Wizard to help you build the expression.
Immediate browseable results: As soon as a file is found it is
available for browsing, even if the search has not yet finished. The browser allows you
to view the lines that were found without having to open the file separately.
A more complicated example
Have you ever written
if (nValue = NULL)
when you meant to write
if (nValue
== NULL)?
Hmm, only me huh? The following example shows how to look through your
code for any line that has an
if with only a single = within the parentheses.
You can then quickly run through the results checking each occurrence.
Conclusion
While this was a bit of a whirlwind tour of Agent Ransack I hope it inspires
you to give it a try and check out the help file for a more detailed description
of it's features. Other features include: Print/Print preview, Search saving,
File context menu, Basic interface option, match case, regular expression
tester, and many more. I hope Agent Ransack saves you many hours of frustrated
searching!
For further information please visit our website at www.AgentRansack.com
