Jamie Howard writes:
> > Perhaps this will help with -w?
> 
> Yes, I received a patch from Simon Burge which implements this.  It also
> beats using [^A-Za-z] and [A-Za-z$] as I was and GNU grep does.   I am
> still having trouble with -x though.  It turns out that even if I specify
> a commandline with a pattern of the form "^pattern$", it fails.  If I
> specify "^pattern" it works.  If I specify "pattern$" it does not.  I
> have yet to find a case where my version will sucessfully match when a $
> is at the end.  Has anyone encountered anything like this before?

If you are using double quotes, as you show here, the shell may be
attempting a variable substitution.  Try single quotes.



-Pat