grep problem with -o and line anchors/

[Nis Jorgensen]

Hello gnu hackers

I am seeing a problem when trying to extract the matching string and
anchoring to the beginning of the string. Using 2.5.1 on Redhat EL4

address@hidden log]$ echo 'abac' | grep -o  '^a.'
ab
ac

This should, IMO, only return "ab", since ac does not match at the
beginning of the link.

Also, if -o is supposed to return multiple occurrences from the same
line, I believe this should be documented. For instance:

-o, --only-matching
        Show only the part of a matching line that matches PATTERN. If multiple
non-overlapping matches are found in the same line, a match is reported
for each.

I believe that this functionality should be disabled by default, but
would be a very nice option.

-- 
Nis Jorgensen
Greenpeace International IT dept.
+31 20 718 2087

The arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends toward justice.