Equivalent of Linux Grep Command

bichonfrise74 has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Hello,

I'm trying to do a simple equivalent of

grep -A1 -B1 'hello' file_name
[download]

in Perl. This basically prints the previous and the next line when the word 'hello' is found. I've done a super search and came up with the following links:

Grep - print matched line and next N lines
Emulating GNU grep -A and -B switches with perl

Both were created back in 2003 and I was wondering if there is now a more concise solution to this. I mean using the Linux 'grep' command, it is able to do it in one line which strikes me odd that it cannot be done in Perl in a concise manner.

Below is my code but again, I think it is too clunky and too long when compared to the Linux 'grep' command.

#!/usr/bin/perl

use strict;

my ($prev, $next);
while (my $line = <DATA>) {
    if ( $next ) {
        print "$line";
        $next = undef;
    }
    if ( $line =~ /hello/ ) {
        print "$prev" if defined( $prev );
        print "$line";
        $next++;
    }
    $prev = $line;
}

__DATA__
test1
test2
hello
test3
test4
[download]

Thanks in advance.

Comment on Equivalent of Linux Grep Command Select or Download Code

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Re: Equivalent of Linux Grep Command by Corion (Patriarch) on Jul 13, 2009 at 19:37 UTC
There is `ack`, which lives in App::Ack, which is considered to be even better than `grep` by some, because it also supports file types, recursive descent through file systems and skips VCS directories.	[reply] [d/l] [select]
Re: Equivalent of Linux Grep Command by thunders (Priest) on Jul 13, 2009 at 19:42 UTC
That's a reasonable start to an implementation. Any solution I can think of involve scanning the file and maintaining @before and @after buffers as you go. Perl isn't really intended to provide one liners for every common unix command, and grep itself is a tool not a programming language, any implementation of grep in C is considerably more than one 80 character line of code. There is a program called prep on CPAN, which is a pure perl implementation of grep. The source to that program may provide inspiration.	[reply]
Re: Equivalent of Linux Grep Command by CountZero (Bishop) on Jul 13, 2009 at 21:19 UTC
Perl being the "glue language" par excellence, why don't you just shell out and call he Unix `grep`? There is no shame in relying on tried and trusted tools. CountZero A program should be light and agile, its subroutines connected like a string of pearls. The spirit and intent of the program should be retained throughout. There should be neither too little or too much, neither needless loops nor useless variables, neither lack of structure nor overwhelming rigidity." - The Tao of Programming, 4.1 - Geoffrey James	[reply] [d/l]
Re: Equivalent of Linux Grep Command by Your Mother (Archbishop) on Jul 13, 2009 at 21:26 UTC
I give a hearty second to ack. Except for the times I need to do huge recursive grepping where grep's speed superiority matters ack is all I use now.	[reply]
Re: Equivalent of Linux Grep Command by JavaFan (Canon) on Jul 13, 2009 at 20:41 UTC
Both were created back in 2003 and I was wondering if there is now a more concise solution to this. Since 2003 there has been only one major release of Perl, and none of the new features would make mimicing `grep -A1 -B1` any simpler than it already is.	[reply]
Re: Equivalent of Linux Grep Command by ambrus (Abbot) on Jul 13, 2009 at 23:10 UTC
cgrep: Egrep clone with function name display links to a few grep-like programs written in perl. Sure, mine is unmaintained too, and I have a page long TODO for it, but I still have it installed on my computer and use it occasionally.	[reply]
Re: Equivalent of Linux Grep Command by petdance (Parson) on Jul 18, 2009 at 06:45 UTC
Even if you don't want to use ack from the command line, take a look at how it handles the -A and -B flags. It's not very complex. xoxo, Andy	[reply]