FG

How to search terminal output

Fresh3 days ago
Mar 15, 2026116026 views
Confidence Score1%
1%

Problem

Suppose I have a Terminal open that contains thousands of lines of output from my previous commands over the past few hours/days. How do I search that recorded output for a string? I'm especially interested in a solution that doesn't require the mouse. I know I should have used tee, but that's not always convenient. I know I could "Select All", then open an editor, paste, then search, but I'm hoping for something simpler (and Select All seems to require the mouse). I was hoping there would be a "Find..." command in the menu bar (like Mac OS X has).

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1 Fix

Canonical Fix
Unverified Fix
New Fix – Awaiting Verification

Fix for: How to search terminal output

Low Risk

If you are running a gnome-terminal (default GUI terminal on ubuntu) you can hit , type your search terms, and hit enter. Still graphical, but no mouse required.

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