[SOLVED] Counting Files in a Directory

esanto1 · 06-11-2013, 11:26 PM

Hi,

I've just created a bash backup script and it does work as it and I just have a question about file counting in a directory.

Below is a snippet of my code which is straightforward but I'm confused by the output. As you can see, I've set a Threshold of 7 to limit the number of backup files however when I tested the script it actually creates 8 files before it stops. This is what I can't seem to understand. If I set the threshold to 7 why is it creating 8 files and then stopping? Does it start counting from zero?

Code:

BACKUPDIR=~/Documents/backup
SOURCEDIR=~/Documents/scripts/*.sh
TOTALBACKUPFILES=`ls $BACKUPDIR/scripts.* | wc -l`
THRESHOLD=7

if [ $TOTALBACKUPFILES -le $THRESHOLD ]

Thanks

chrism01 · 06-12-2013, 12:19 AM

1. that should work, but show us the rest of the script, as the 'creates 8 files' bit is probably where the issue is.

2. Use [[ ]] in pref to [ ] http://tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/testcon...ml#DBLBRACKETS, but for arithmetic operations, use (( )) which enables you to use the normal maths symbols http://www.tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/ops.html

3. add 'set -xv' at the top of your script; it shows what the parser is doing in detail. A great debug tool

4. ensure you specify the exact shell at the top of the script

Code:

#!/bin/bash

(Use 'which bash' to check the path first)

Useful links
http://rute.2038bug.com/index.html.gz
http://tldp.org/LDP/Bash-Beginners-G...tml/index.html
http://www.tldp.org/LDP/abs/html/
http://mywiki.wooledge.org/

esanto1 · 06-12-2013, 12:45 AM

Here's the full script.

Code:

#!/bin/bash

BACKUPFILE=scripts.backup.$(date +%H%M%S_%d%m%y)
BACKUPDIR=~/Documents/backup
SOURCEDIR=~/Documents/scripts/*.sh
TOTALBACKUPFILES=`ls $BACKUPDIR/scripts.* | wc -l`
THRESHOLD=7

if [ $TOTALBACKUPFILES -le $THRESHOLD ]
 then
        tar cvfj $BACKUPDIR/$BACKUPFILE.tar.bz2 $SOURCEDIR >/dev/null 2>>../backup/errors.txt 
        if [ $? != 0 ]
         then 
                echo "Problems creating the backup file"
        fi
fi
#END

evo2 · 06-12-2013, 12:55 AM

Hi,

you are using -le which is "less than or equal to", so if there are 7 files it will evaluate to true and create an 8th file. Perhaps you want to use -lt.

Evo2.

esanto1 · 06-12-2013, 01:08 AM

Hi Evo2,

Had to re-read the code a few times but your explanation does make sense now.

Thanks