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Info Node: (emacs)Word Search

(emacs)Word Search


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Word Search
===========

   Word search searches for a sequence of words without regard to how
the words are separated.  More precisely, you type a string of many
words, using single spaces to separate them, and the string can be
found even if there are multiple spaces, newlines, or other punctuation
characters between these words.

   Word search is useful for editing a printed document made with a text
formatter.  If you edit while looking at the printed, formatted version,
you can't tell where the line breaks are in the source file.  With word
search, you can search without having to know them.

`C-s <RET> C-w WORDS <RET>'
     Search for WORDS, ignoring details of punctuation.

`C-r <RET> C-w WORDS <RET>'
     Search backward for WORDS, ignoring details of punctuation.

   Word search is a special case of nonincremental search and is invoked
with `C-s <RET> C-w'.  This is followed by the search string, which
must always be terminated with <RET>.  Being nonincremental, this
search does not start until the argument is terminated.  It works by
constructing a regular expression and searching for that; see Note:
Regexp Search.

   Use `C-r <RET> C-w' to do backward word search.

   Forward and backward word searches are implemented by the commands
`word-search-forward' and `word-search-backward'.  These commands may
be bound to keys in the usual manner.  They are available via the
incremental search commands both for historical reasons and to avoid
the need to find suitable key sequences for them.


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