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How to generate a list of filenames in Bash?
From man find: -exec command {} + This variant of the -exec action runs the specified command on the selected files, but the command line is built by appending each selected file name at the end; the total number of invoca‐ tions of the command will be much less than the number of matched files.
When to pass-before a file name in Bash?
If you have a file name that begins with a variable part, be sure to pass — before it, as in the snippet above. This indicates to the command that it has reached the end of options, so anything after that is a file name even if it starts with – or +.
When does field splitting and filename generation occur?
Field splitting and filename generation only happen in list context, but that’s most of the time. Double quotes delimit a string context: the whole double-quoted string is a single string, not to be split.
Can a file name begin with a dash?
On a related note, keep in mind that file names can begin with a – (dash/minus), which most commands interpret as denoting an option. Some commands (like sh, set or sort) also accept options that start with +. If you have a file name that begins with a variable part, be sure to pass — before it, as in the snippet above.
How to run Bash command on one file?
For instance, to run the command on 1 file: The following bash code will pass $file to command where $file will represent every file in /dir -maxdepth 1 argument prevents find from recursively descending into any subdirectories.
How to double quote a file name in Bash?
Double-quoting the filenames properly solves the cases when the names contain glob characters or white-spaces. But *nix filenames can also contain newlines in them.
How do you de limit files in Bash?
So we de-limit filenames with the only character that cannot be part of a valid filename – the null byte ( \\0 ). Since bash internally uses C style strings in which the null bytes are used to indicate the end of string, it is the right candidate for this.