Each editor tab in Nova has a find banner for searching within its content, but when you need to perform a search (or search-and-replace) operation across many files, it’s easier to use the Find sidebar.
The find sidebar contains the following items:
- Find And Replace Fields
- Type the text you wish to find in the Find field. If you also want to replace the found text with alternate text, type the desired replacement text into the Replace field.
- Match Text Case
- When enabled, find will present only matches that also match in case. In other words, “cat” will not match “CAT”.
- Search Only In Selection
- When enabled, the find will be performed only in the current text selection. Normally, the entire document is searched.
- Match Only Whole Words
- When enabled, find will only match the find term in its entirety and ignore partial matches. For example, “cat” will not match “catalog”.
- Use Regular Expressions
- When enabled, your find term will be evaluated as a regular expression rather than literal text. Regular expressions are a powerful pattern matching language. A full explanation is beyond the scope of this document. Consult your favorite internet search engine for more information on regular expressions.
- Find
- Searches all files in the current workspace for the text entered into the Find field.
- Replace All
- Replaces every found match with the text from the Replace field. Afterward, a number will appear in the Replace field indicating how many occurrences were replaced.
Find Sidebar Options
Access the Find options pop-up by clicking on the blue star icon to the left of the find field.
Clicking this icon will show recent searches you have performed so you can quickly reuse them. Additionally, you’ll see a number of placeholder tokens that can be inserted into the Find or Replace fields. We’ll cover placeholders later in this section.
Below the Find field, you’ll see the In Project button. Clicking this will display a list of project-specific folders to search, as well as a Search Scope section that allows you to specify searching by File Name, File Path, File Extension, Document Status, and or Source Control Status.
Search scopes can be deleted by selecting them, then pressing the delete key.
Access the Replace options pop-up by clicking on the blue star icon to the left of the replace field. Selecting any placeholder in this menu will insert it into the Replace field.
Using Placeholders in Find and Replace
Placeholders can be used to perform find and replace operations when the desired text varies, but follows a consistent pattern. Placeholders are inserted by clicking the blue star icon located in the Find and Replace fields.
The following placeholders are accessible via the Find field:
Any- Matches any Characters
Word- Matches any Word Characters
#- Matches any Digits
_- Matches any Whitespace
→- Matches any Tabstop
Break- Matches any Word Break
⏎- Matches any Line Break
The Replace field supports both the Tab and Line Break placeholders.