the_silver_searcher
agent-ready non-interactive
A code-searching tool similar to ack, but faster.
How to install the_silver_searcher
brew install the_silver_searcher the_silver_searcher use case
Rapidly locate specific substrings, regex patterns, or code definitions across large codebases while respecting ignore files.
When to use the_silver_searcher
- Searching for function definitions or variable usages across a large repository
- Filtering search results based on .gitignore or .ignore rules automatically
- Performing high-performance text searches where grep or ack are too slow
When not to use the_silver_searcher
- When semantic code understanding (AST-based) is required rather than raw text matching
- When searching within binary files or non-text assets
the_silver_searcher features
- · Automatic honors .gitignore and .hgignore
- · High-performance C implementation utilizing PCRE
- · Support for a custom .ignore file
- · Context-aware searching (before/after lines)
Want your agent to find this automatically?
Add the MCP server to your agent config and it will discover tools like the_silver_searcher on its own.
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