>Yes whitespace always. [root at dev ~]# echo " CP_" | egrep -e "\ CP_" CP_ [root at dev ~]# echo "CPLAT::CP_" | egrep -e "\ CP_" [root at dev ~]# >So what I am doing is a massive replace. So this grep will allow me to see how many instances still need to be replaced. > >I am replacing CP_ with CPLAT::CP_ and when i execute the grep I want to ignore CPLAT:CP_ so I just see the CP_ that still need to be done. Typo in that? You want to ignore " CPLAT::CP_" right? Depends on what tool you use and what std it follows, I don't even think you need to escape the "space".