grep exact string from file shell

I have a host file with two lines:

1.1.1.1 host

1.2.3.4 host-MY

I'd like to gr开发者_StackOverflow中文版ep the line contains host string only (not the other line that contain host-MY)

I use: grep -x host /etc/hosts but -x search whole line matching Thanks in advance

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EDIT: dashes are considered as word separator. Try this one instead:

grep -E '(^|[[:space:]])host($|[[:space:]])' /etc/hosts

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Old post:

You can use:

grep -w host /etc/hosts

This works fine on Solaris with /usr/xpg4/bin/grep.

The portable version would be:

grep -E '\<host\>' /etc/hosts

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How about this:

grep -E "\s*host\s*$" /etc/hosts

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Try

grep -q -E "\bhost\b" /etc/hosts