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doc: "to rip" means "fast"
Answer the origin story of ripgrep's name.
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FAQ.md
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FAQ.md
@ -21,6 +21,7 @@
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* [How do I create a PowerShell profile?](#powershell-profile)
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* [How do I pipe non-ASCII content to ripgrep on Windows?](#pipe-non-ascii-windows)
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* [Can ripgrep replace grep?](#posix4ever)
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* [What does the "rip" in ripgrep mean?](#intentcountsforsomething)
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<h3 name="config">
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@ -530,3 +531,39 @@ for the previous section apply.
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* Is there a particular feature of grep you rely on that ripgrep either doesn't
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have or never will have? If the former, file a bug report, maybe ripgrep can
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do it! If the latter, well, then, just use grep.
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<h3 name="intentcountsforsomething">
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What does the "rip" in ripgrep mean?
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</h3>
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When I first started writing ripgrep, I called it `rep`, intending it to be a
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shorter variant of `grep`. Soon after, I renamed it to `xrep` since `rep`
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wasn't obvious enough of a name for my taste. And also because adding `x` to
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anything always makes it better, right?
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Before ripgrep's first public release, I decided that I didn't like `xrep`. I
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thought it was slightly awkward to type, and despite my previous praise of the
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letter `x`, I kind of thought it was pretty lame. Being someone who really
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likes Rust, I wanted to call it "rustgrep" or maybe "rgrep" for short. But I
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thought that was just as lame, and maybe a little too in-your-face. But I
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wanted to continue using `r` so I could at least pretend Rust had something to
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do with it.
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I spent a couple of days trying to think of very short words that began with
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the letter `r` that were even somewhat related to the task of searching. I
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don't remember how it popped into my head, but "rip" came up as something that
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meant "fast," as in, "to rip through your text." The fact that RIP is also an
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initialism for "Rest in Peace" (as in, "ripgrep kills grep") never really
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dawned on me. Perhaps the coincidence is too striking, but I didn't realize it
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until someone explicitly pointed it out to me after the initial public realize.
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I admit that I found it mildly amusing, but if I had realized it myself before
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the public release, I probably would have pressed on and chose a different
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name. Alas, renaming things after a release is hard, so I decided to mush on.
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Given the fact that
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[ripgrep never was, is or will be a 100% drop-in replacement for
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grep](#posix4ever),
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ripgrep is neither actually a "grep killer" nor was it ever intended to be. It
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certainly does eat into some of its use cases, but that's nothing that other
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tools like ack or The Silver Searcher weren't already doing.
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