{"id":6401,"date":"2015-09-01T15:35:41","date_gmt":"2015-09-01T19:35:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/g33kinfo.com\/info\/?p=6401"},"modified":"2015-09-01T15:35:41","modified_gmt":"2015-09-01T19:35:41","slug":"grep-reading-apache-error-log-as-binary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/g33kinfo.com\/info\/grep-reading-apache-error-log-as-binary\/","title":{"rendered":"Grep Reading Apache Error Log as Binary"},"content":{"rendered":"

An issue was recently noted where ‘grep<\/em><\/strong>‘ was throwing the error:<\/p>\n


\nroot@host [~]# zgrep \"ajax\" \/usr\/local\/apache\/logs\/error_log
\nBinary file (standard input) matches
\n<\/code><\/p>\n

The permissions were checked, and several other ‘grep<\/em><\/strong>‘ type commands were attempted and all returned the same error. In addition, the ‘head<\/em><\/strong>‘, ‘tail<\/em><\/strong>‘ and ‘less<\/em><\/strong>‘ commands all returned the normal log information to standard output.<\/p>\n

In reviewing the issue, if there is a NUL character anywhere in the file, ‘grep<\/em><\/strong>‘ (or zgrep<\/em><\/strong>, egrep<\/em><\/strong>…etc.) will consider it as a binary file. <\/p>\n

To solve this, use the ‘-r<\/strong>‘ or – – text<\/strong> flags to process the binary file as if it were standard text; these flags are equivalent to the –binary-files=text<\/strong> option.<\/p>\n


\negrep -r -a mystring
\n<\/code>
\nor
\n
\ngrep -a\/--text<\/code><\/p>\n

The downside to this is that the data returned may well result in binary information being sent to your terminal. This is not a good idea if you’re running a terminal such as VT\/DEC or many others that interprets the output stream. Alternatively, you can pipe\/output the file through ‘tr’ with the following command:
\n
\ntr '[\\000-\\011\\013-\\037\\177-\\377]' '.'
\nwhich will change anything less than a space character (except newline) and anything greater than 126, into a . character, leaving only the printable characters.<\/p>\n

Nike!<\/test><\/code><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

An issue was recently noted where ‘grep‘ was throwing the error: root@host [~]# zgrep “ajax” \/usr\/local\/apache\/logs\/error_log Binary file (standard input) matches The permissions were checked, and several other ‘grep‘ type commands were attempted and all returned the same error. In addition, the ‘head‘, ‘tail‘ and ‘less‘ commands all returned the normal log information to standard… <\/p>\n

Read More<\/i><\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6401","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-info"],"yoast_head":"\nGrep Reading Apache Error Log as Binary - Linux Shtuff<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/g33kinfo.com\/info\/grep-reading-apache-error-log-as-binary\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Grep Reading Apache Error Log as Binary - Linux Shtuff\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"An issue was recently noted where ‘grep‘ was throwing the error: root@host [~]# zgrep "ajax" \/usr\/local\/apache\/logs\/error_log Binary file (standard input) matches The permissions were checked, and several other ‘grep‘ type commands were attempted and all returned the same error. In addition, the ‘head‘, ‘tail‘ and ‘less‘ commands all returned the normal log information to standard... 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My passion for all things tech drives my hunt for all the coolz. 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