I don't remember why I stopped using the shorter `egrep` and only use `grep -E`, but I suspect this was the reason. I used to work on a variety of BSD and Linux servers.
I'm fine with this clean-up and simplification. Eventually, there will be more future users of `grep` than past users.
Yeah, I worked with enough older systems (SunOS, Solaris, AIX, HPUX, FreeBSD/NetBSD/OpenBSD, etc.) that I don't remember which ones caused me to do that, either. I'm really glad it's no longer common to have things like hand-compiled installs of GNU utilities, especially since not every sysadmin was diligent about updating all of them.
I'm fine with this clean-up and simplification. Eventually, there will be more future users of `grep` than past users.