Find and replace
To find or replace text in a file open in the Editor window, press CTRL+f to bring up the Find dialog box, or press CTRL+r to bring up the Replace dialog box. The Find/Replace dialog box gives you checkboxes which enable you to choose any combination of the following options:
- Highlight Search - to highlight all occurrences of the search text in the file
- Incremental Search - for the search engine to try to find the text as you type (without having to press the Find button)
- Match Case - to limit the search to text that has the same capitalization
- Smart Case - to limit the search to text that has the same capitalization when at least one character of the search text is upper case. Removed in NetBeans 4.1.
- Match Whole Words Only - to match the search text only to whole words in the file
- Backward Search - to search in reverse order in the file
- Wrap Search - to continue the search at the beginning (or end) of the file
- Regular Expression Search - enables to search a string according to a regular expression. Introduced in NetBeans 4.1.
- Selection Search - enables to search a string in selected text only. Introduced in NetBeans 4.1.
You can also search using the following keyboard shortcuts:
- F3 - to find the next occurrence of the search text
- SHIFT+F3 - to find the previous occurrence of the search text
- CTRL+F3 - to find the next occurrence of the selected string or, if nothing is selected, the word that the insertion point is in
- ALT+SHIFT+h - to switch the highlight search feature on or off
