I sometime need to check some logs and I do this with this command: egrep -o "success|error|fail" <filename> | sort | uniq -c Sample input: test error on line 10 test connect success test insert success test started at 00:00 test delete fail Sample output: 1 error 1 fail 2 success I would like to know if someone knows a way to do this with a shorter command? Before you ask why I would like to do this with an different command... No special reason, I'm just curious :)