hello,
i'm just curious if i can search for the dir/file pattern in the single "find" command?
here is an example:

dir1/dir2/dir3/file.txt
dirXX/dirYY/dir2/dir3/file.txt
dir1/dir4/dir3/file.txt

i want to search for the pattern "dir2/dir3/file.txt"

man find
/regex


Cheers,
Tink

Have you looked at the 'find' command. It has a lot of options, such as setting type to regular file, specifying the desired path, and even things like newer / older than a particular time. A simple example, assuming I am interpreting your examples correctly, would be like:
Edit: I see that Tinkster beat me to it.

1 members found this post helpful.

The search directory or directories are given separately from the filename, so if you want to find a particular file, file.txt, in directory /home/me/myfiles you would search by:

find /home/me/myfiles -name file.txt

You can also search more than one directory for filenames or patterns, for example:

find /etc /var -name '*.log'

The find utility is a very powerful search tool. Refer to the man pages for more information.

i think i didn't formulate my question right. Let me clarify :
i want to search for the pattern "dir2/dir3/file.txt", not from the current directory, but across several other directories.
The idea is that the same file (file.txt) maybe in several directories and to uniquely identify the right one i need to bring the 2 directories (above it) into equation...
hope this helps . If not - please let me know.

So in Noway2's example, i can't use dir1/dir2 as a starting search directory - because i should be able to search in any directory.

smth like this :
find directory_Blah -name 'dir2/dir3/file.txt'

I probably should also note that i'm stuck on Solaris. ( don't have gnu here )

To Tink:
man find
/regex
Pattern not found

.
I did RTFM and nothing caught my eye. I tried playing with ' and \ as well as adding * instead of /. But that didn't help. apparently i'm missing smth obvious.

If that is the case then you have left out some information, ie like what system are you on and what version of find?

1 members found this post helpful.

Sunos5.10 and hmmm. no idea what version of find it is ...

This should tell you:

find: illegal option -- version
find: [-H | -L] path-list predicate-list

Hi,

I do not know if your 'find' has those options but you might want to search for '-path' and/or '-wholename' option in the manpage.

1 members found this post helpful.

Yeah, the find that comes with Solaris by default is an antique,
doesn't know half the features of GNU find.


Easiest will be to find . -type f | grep dir1/dir2/file.


Cheers,
Tink

1 members found this post helpful.

yeah, i gave up to make it work as i wanted and did exactly the same way you suggested. Thank you anyway!

Here is the link to find's man page, that looks like the one i;m dealing with http://www.bga.org/~lessem/psyc5112/...is/find.1.html

ehh, i looked for those - nope, nothing. See my previous comment. Maybe you can spot smth i failed to?