How do I copy multiple files

Leary664 · 07-12-2005, 12:06 PM

Hi All,
I need you help. I have a CD with a bunch of 2kb images on it that need to be copied to a directory on the hard disk. As you may know, you can't use the "cp" command to do this. I know theres a way to use the "find" command and pipe it to the "cp" command but I don't know the syntex. It's something like......

find -name '*.jpg' | xargs cp /Directory_to_copy_to

Any Ideas?
Thanks kids

Leary

Matir · 07-12-2005, 12:27 PM

I'm not quite sure why 'cp /mnt/cdrom/*.jpg /directory/to/copy/to' wouldn't work, unless they're in a bunch of directories.

Otherwise, using xargs:

Code:

find /mnt/cdrom -iname '*.jpg' | xargs cp {} /directory/to/copy/to

nadroj · 07-12-2005, 12:30 PM

have you tried doing something like

Code:

$ cp *.jpg /path/to/Folder

the cp command DOES allow you to copy multiple files to one directory.. do a variation of this and post the error message if so

Leary664 · 07-12-2005, 01:39 PM

Ok. First off, thanks for the replies.

If I use "find" I get the error....

cp: copying multiple files, but last argument `/mnt/cdrom/current_image_name.jpg` is not a directory

It does this over and over again for each images it trys to copy. so I ctrl-C out of it.

If I try cp *.jpg /path/to/Folder

I get the error.....

Argument list too long

The CD has around 30,000 2kb thumbnail images on it for our website. My only guess is that there's too many files to copy at once.
Any other ideas?

Thanks for the help guys.
Leary

Matir · 07-12-2005, 01:41 PM

Exactly what is the find command you are running? I accidentally left off [--replace] after xargs. Try it with:

Code:

find /mnt/cdrom -iname '*.jpg' | xargs --replace cp {} /new/directory

Leary664 · 07-12-2005, 01:45 PM

Oh, and I can copy a single file with the cp command but I'd rather no have to do it 30,000 times. I guess it would be good job security tho...

Matir · 07-12-2005, 01:47 PM

Did you try my revised find and xargs-based solution?

Leary664 · 07-12-2005, 01:50 PM

Looks like that might be working I'll have to let it finish looping through all 30,000. We'll see what happens.
Thanks again, I'll let you know how I make out.
Leary

Matir · 07-12-2005, 01:52 PM

Cool, I hope it works for you. I imagine it might take a few minutes to go through it all.

Leary664 · 07-12-2005, 02:09 PM

Yep

find /mnt/cdrom -iname '*.jpg' | xargs --replace cp {} /new/directory

Worked. Thanks for all of you help.
Leary

Matir · 07-12-2005, 02:13 PM

No problem. Glad it worked.

WhatsHisName · 07-12-2005, 11:26 PM

Sounds like a job for rsync.

rsync -a /mnt/cdrom/*.jpg /new/directory

See:

man rsync

Matir · 07-13-2005, 08:45 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by WhatsHisName
Sounds like a job for rsync.

rsync -a /mnt/cdrom/*.jpg /new/directory

See:

man rsync

/mnt/cdrom/*.jpg would generate "Argument list too long" again.

WhatsHisName · 07-13-2005, 09:39 AM

Quote:

/mnt/cdrom/*.jpg would generate "Argument list too long" again.

That’s interesting. I’ve used rsync on several occasions to copy over 800,000 files at a time when moving things around on servers. It takes a while, but a lot less time than cp.

Matir · 07-13-2005, 10:49 AM

Quote:

Originally posted by WhatsHisName
That’s interesting. I’ve used rsync on several occasions to copy over 800,000 files at a time when moving things around on servers. It takes a while, but a lot less time than cp.

If you wanted to move everything in /mnt/cdrom, it would be fine to use rsync /mnt/cdrom /destination, but with the *.jpg, that causes the shell to perform file globbing (wildcard expansion), generating an argument list > 131,072 characters (at least on my machine, 'getconf ARG_MAX' to check yours).