That's possible, but it's not that different from the current API as a whole, it would be equivalent to simply adding searchText parameter (as start location was only used for CLI already)

And if I split open & match i'd be weird to handle the save cursor option and furthermore the onBufferOpen would run before finding matches, and now you'd have start position (either from +lin:col for filename), onBufferOpen and then match, it would be very confusing to me...

Feel free to propose something, but this seemed the "sanest" model to implement to me

I think NewBufferFromFileWithCommand is a weird API to have

That was my first though too, but after a closer look, it looks like quite a sane generalization of AtLoc. Also:

it's coupled to how the CLI works

Potentially we might use this concept of "command" not just in the CLI but also in some other cases at runtime, like it is used in vim (and vi, ed, sed...).

Ping?

@JoeKar what do you think about merging this?

@JoeKar what do you think about merging this?

No bad idea and...

Potentially we might use this concept of "command" not just in the CLI [...]

...we're able to extend the command easily.

What I'm struggling with is the fact, that NewBufferFromFileAtLoc() is gone without any simple wrapper to NewBufferFromFileWithCommand(). This will affect plugins currently using this method.
Furthermore we shouldn't introduce any further regexp.MustCompile()'s, especially when user input is parsed. I remember here #3700, which caused the panic looking like a crash of micro's code.

This will affect plugins currently using this method.

Are they? I don't think we export it to lua.

Furthermore we shouldn't introduce any further regexp.MustCompile()'s, especially when user input is parsed.

But here we don't pass any user input (or any other non-constant input) to regexp.MustCompile(), we only pass constant strings? They either always compile, or never compile?

@JoeKar what do you think about merging this?

No bad idea and...

Potentially we might use this concept of "command" not just in the CLI [...]

...we're able to extend the command easily.

What I'm struggling with is the fact, that NewBufferFromFileAtLoc() is gone without any simple wrapper to NewBufferFromFileWithCommand(). This will affect plugins currently using this method.

I admit I'm not particularly aware of how plugins work, but I don't expect go functions to be directly callable from there? That's why I removed it as I assumed it wasn't exported.

Furthermore we shouldn't introduce any further regexp.MustCompile()'s, especially when user input is parsed. I remember here #3700, which caused the panic looking like a crash of micro's code.

But isn't that more of an architectural issue?
If for the search functionality you enforce the regex to be valid that means even the current find functionality is broken, I simply use that infrastructure.

This will affect plugins currently using this method.

Are they? I don't think we export it to lua.

You're right. It can't be accessed.

Furthermore we shouldn't introduce any further regexp.MustCompile()'s, especially when user input is parsed.

But here we don't pass any user input (or any other non-constant input) to regexp.MustCompile(), we only pass constant strings? They either always compile, or never compile?

You're right again. Here we only search for the search string within the arguments. The user string will cause problems at the same location as in #3700 (with +/\\Q).

But isn't that more of an architectural issue?

At least a bad design decision, in case the "wrong" regexp interface is used for arbitrary user input.

that means even the current find functionality is broken

More or less yes. Some corner cases will actually lead to a crash (see linked issue).

Can this be merged?

We can merge it in case @dmaluka doesn't disagree.

LGTM (I think I already approved this PR a while ago), except the following (echoing the discussion and outcome of #3812):

1. This?

--- a/cmd/micro/micro.go
+++ b/cmd/micro/micro.go
@@ -48,7 +48,7 @@ var (
 func InitFlags() {
 	// Note: keep this in sync with the man page in assets/packaging/micro.1
 	flag.Usage = func() {
-		fmt.Println("Usage: micro [OPTION]... [FILE]... [+LINE[:COL]]")
+		fmt.Println("Usage: micro [OPTION]... [FILE]... [+LINE[:COL]] [+/REGEX]")
 		fmt.Println("       micro [OPTION]... [FILE[:LINE[:COL]]]...  (only if the `parsecursor` option is enabled)")
 		fmt.Println("-clean")
 		fmt.Println("    \tClean the configuration directory and exit")

2. Keep the man page in sync, i.e. this?

diff --git a/assets/packaging/micro.1 b/assets/packaging/micro.1
index dbd2cc80..909bbde6 100644
--- a/assets/packaging/micro.1
+++ b/assets/packaging/micro.1
@@ -1,11 +1,12 @@
-.TH micro 1 "2025-08-16"
+.TH micro 1 "2025-09-03"
 .SH NAME
 micro \- A modern and intuitive terminal-based text editor
 .SH SYNOPSIS
 .B micro
 .RI [ OPTION ]...\&
 .RI [ FILE ]...\&
-.RI [+ LINE [: COL ]]
+.RI [+ LINE [: COL ]]\&
+.RI [+/ REGEX ]
 .br
 .B micro
 .RI [ OPTION ]...\&
@@ -40,6 +41,11 @@ Specify a custom location for the configuration directory
 Specify a line and column to start the cursor at when opening a buffer
 .RE
 .PP
+.RI +/ REGEX
+.RS 4
+Specify a regex to search for when opening a buffer
+.RE
+.PP
 .B \-options
 .RS 4
 Show all options help and exit

Done, I hope the man changes are good, I don't know the syntax at all