Search and Replace

There’s one small but incredibly useful function which differentiates regular reading, or analysis of a document, to that done on a computer, and that’s the search function. What’s more, some applications are specialized to not only identify particular text strings, but also replace them, which is also the case with Search and Replace.

Once launched, the application shows up with a default configuration targeting its source folder just to serve as a sample. All functions are in plain sight, and even though it can seem a little more than what you expect from a search and replace tool, it’s pretty intuitive in its manner, with various filters and configurations.

On the one hand, you need to provide a source path where files you want to scan are located, and this can easily be done through a drag and drop operation. Needless to say that the target string, as well as the replace words need to be filled in. The application only scans file formats you choose, with the possibility to include, or exclude custom extensions.

You don’t necessarily have to replace strings, with available functions for search, replace, and touch, which is merely a way to modify file attributes like access and creation date, or attributes including archive, system, hidden, and read only.

Additional parameters can be added before an operation is put in motion. Setting flags can match character casing, include subdirectories in search, match whole word, regular expression, ignore whitespace, or HTML mode to convert plain text to HTML code snippets. Results can be saved to file for later quick processing, opened up in the associated viewer, or previewed as HTML.

All things considered, we can safely state that Search and Replace is a powerful application which can identify custom text strings to match particular flags, and replace them with other words or entire expressions. It’s sure to come in handy for batch manipulation of standard forms, as well as HTML quick editing.