Using File Filters

By default, Find in Files searches all files in your project - the whole tree beneath the root folder that's open in Brackets. You can exclude files, file types, whole folders, or other patterns:

1. Click the "Edit..." button
2. Enter one or more patterns to exclude

The more files you exclude from your search, the faster Find in Files will run.

About filter patterns

A simple string matches any item whose full path includes that substring:

• README matches /code/README.md, /code/modules/README/main.js, /code/myREADME.txt, etc.
• /node_modules/ matches /code/node_modules/foo.js, /code/node_modules/sub/bar.js, etc.
  but does not match /code/node_modules_two/foo.js, etc.

Note: Always use forward slashes in filter paths, even on Windows. Brackets standardizes paths on all platforms to use "/" separators.

You can also use wildcards:

• node_* matches /code/node_modules/foo.js, /code/node_core/foo.js, /code/node_foo.txt, etc.
• *.txt matches /code/readme.txt, /code/readme.js.txt, etc.
  but does not match /code/module.txt/foo.js or /code/notes.txt2 (filter strings containing "." are treated as filenames, so they won't match folder names or anything else with chars trailing the string you've entered - see below)
• /jquery*.js matches /code/jquery-2.1.0.js, /code/foo/jquery-1.7.min.js, etc.
• jquery-1.?.js matches /code/jquery-1.6.js but not /code/jquery-1.6.1.js

A * matches within a path segment (that is, it doesn't match "/" characters). To match "/" as well, use **:

• thirdparty/**/jquery*.js matches /code/thirdparty/jquery-1.7.js, /code/thirdparty/foo/jquery-2.1.0.min.js, etc.
  but does not match /code/jquery-1.7.js

(note that the "/"s surrounding a "**" can collapse, as in the first example above)

Details

To enable you to write simple filters that don't always include **s, Brackets automatically adds ** using the following rules:

• A ** prefix is always added - unless the filter string already starts with **
• A ** suffix is added unless the filter string's last path segment contains a "." (suggesting it's a filename) - or unless the filter string already ends with **

After this conversion, the filter string must match the entire absolute path of a file for it to be filtered out.