feat: add --exact flag to only match exact anime titles (#1851)

[emre-tiryaki]

Pull Request Template

Type of change

• Bug fix
• Feature
• Documentation update

Description

This feature is asked in issue #1851

I added --exact/--exact-match style flag that filters search results to only those whose title is an exact (case-insensitive) match for the query. Useful for wrapper scripts that risk auto-selecting the wrong show when only one result comes back.

when the --exact flag is used, the program wants to given query and anime names to be an exact match(case-insensitive). If there is no exact match it says "No exact match found.".

Checklist

• any anime playing
• bumped version

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• next, prev, replay and select work
• -c history and continue work
• -d downloads work
• -e (select episode) aka -r (range selection) works
• -S select index works
• -q quality works
• -s syncplay works
• -v vlc works
• --dub and regular (sub) mode both work
• --nextep-countdown countdown to next ep works

---

• -h help info is up to date
• Readme is up to date
• Man page is up to date

Additional Testcases

(these don't block a merge)

• --skip ani-skip works
• --no-detach no detach works
• --exit-after-play auto exit after playing works

Copy Pasta

./ani-cli -V
./ani-cli -S 1 -e 1 -d flcl
./ani-cli -S 1 -e 1 -q worst -v flcl
./ani-cli -c -s --dub

[Copilot]

Copilot review overview

🟡 Changes recommended

Preserve literal + characters when comparing exact titles.

Review effort: Lite
Findings: 1

Open (1)

• Preserve literal plus signs in exact-match queries · New

What changed in this PR

Adds a case-insensitive --exact option for filtering anime search results.

Changes:

• Implements exact-title matching and no-match handling.
• Updates help text and version to 5.1.5.
• Documents the option in the man page.

The exact-match logic incorrectly treats literal + characters as spaces, preventing valid titles such as C++ from matching.

File	Description
ani-cli	Implements the new flag and filtering logic.
ani-cli.1	Documents the --exact option.

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[port19x]

Ah you made a new one.
Could you make it an environment variable instead?
ANI_CLI_EXACT

[emre-tiryaki]

@port19x I made the change you requested.

Before: ani-cli --exact "Jujutsu Kaisen"
After ANI_CLI_EXACT=1 ani-cli "Jujutsu Kaisen"

[port19x]

Does not work for titles containing a space

[emre-tiryaki]

Sorry for the inconvenience. I was testing with double quotes, did not test without it.

[port19x]

Tested successfully, thanks for the PR