Lightning Talk: Ack

by Cameron Pope

In the video titled 'Lightning Talk: Ack', Cameron Pope discusses the use of the tool ACK, primarily aimed at programmers and developers who frequently search through large codebases. The talk is presented at the Rocky Mountain Ruby 2012 event, highlighting how ACK provides an efficient and powerful alternative to traditional file search methods like GREP.

Key points include:
- Introduction to ACK: ACK is a search tool specifically designed for finding files quickly within code projects, making it more efficient than GREP.
- Speed and Efficiency: Cameron demonstrates the speed of ACK by conducting a search across a large Rails project with over 8,000 files, retrieving results in about two seconds. This rapid performance allows developers to maintain their focus on coding rather than spending excessive time searching for files or keywords.
- Code-Specific Searches: ACK’s capability to search specifically within certain file types (such as HTML or Ruby) enhances usability, as developers can narrow their search to relevant code. The tool defaults intelligently regarding case sensitivity and recognizes project file types.
- Installation: The tool can be easily installed, especially on macOS via Homebrew, while also being functional on Windows, albeit with some necessary adjustments for specific file entries related to Rails development.
- Additional Features: ACK comes with command-line options for tailored searches and integrates well with text editors like Vim, improving the developer experience by allowing navigation between search results directly within the editor.
- Resources: Cameron promotes social sharing of presentations via Twitter hashtags, providing easy access to additional resources for attendees wanting to explore ACK further.

Concluding on a strong note, Cameron encourages developers to transition from GREP to ACK, emphasizing the tool’s benefits for a better coding experience. It serves not only as a search utility but significantly contributes to a streamlined coding workflow, making it a valuable asset for developers.

00:00:05.520 I am here to talk about ACK. Who here uses ACK? Alright, looks like we have about 50/50 here. And for the 50% that don't, this is a simple little tool that has made my life much better. So, I am excited to share that with you because I'm always looking for simple things that will improve my life.

00:00:11.010 For example, I just gave myself a promotion thanks to Roy's talk about freelance architecture. Simple things really can make my life better. I'm a freelance architect, and there are my handles and stuff for you to find me. I love solving hard problems, so let me know if you have one. I think this topic actually ties into many talks we give about organizing code. We discuss taking the big mess on the floor and neatly arranging it into little boxes, placing those boxes somewhere convenient. However, this doesn't make it any easier to find things.

00:00:35.070 We also talk about reading code, and one of the best ways to read and understand code is to start asking questions and see what answers you get, which applies the same to new projects. So, what is ACK? ACK finds files quickly and efficiently. It is specifically designed for code and works exceptionally well with code projects. It is better than GREP—it's faster, more intuitive, and skips things like your Git repository by default.

00:01:14.880 Now, what's the big deal about that? I was going to quickly bring up a window to show you. Let's say I have an app with 8,001 files; it's a pretty large Rails project. If I want to find something, for example, the word 'quest', it is pretty fast. In fact, the search pulls everything from cache. This is on my ancient MacBook Air, and your new iPhones probably have better processing speed.

00:01:43.259 It goes through all 8,000 files in about two seconds, so that's something to be excited about. It’s also nice to be able to search for specific fields, like looking for something in my HTML files, and it will search just those files. If I want to find something in Ruby files, I can do that as well. So, there it is; it’s found in the specs and other relevant files. It has intelligent defaults about case sensitivity and is also very fast.

00:02:06.170 This speed is beneficial because, as Mike says, maintaining focus is priceless. If you don’t spend a lot of time trying to find things, you can keep your mind on your task. That’s the big deal about ACK. It's straightforward to install—if you have Homebrew, just run 'brew install ack'. Just like that.

00:02:23.630 You can even install it on Windows, and it works much better than anything I ever used to find things in a project on Windows. You might need to tweak it a bit; for instance, it may not recognize some of the specific files we use in Rails development. You can give it command-line options, stating things like you want to search HTML files and make the search case insensitive unless uppercase letters are used.

00:03:05.480 There are also additional nice features available. I’ve posted the presentation on Twitter under the hashtag for Rocky Mountain Ruby, and there’s also an ACK plugin for Vim, which is an awesome tool that allows you to do all kinds of useful things. It gives you a nice little quick fix window, and if I had my screen sized just a bit smaller, you would see some context around the matches.

00:03:44.900 You can navigate to the matches seamlessly, seeing all the references in one place. I've posted the slides on the Rocky Mountain Ruby hashtag as well. So, there you go—get rid of GREP and use ACK!