Understanding FIND

johnywhy · 05-03-2015, 04:16 PM

hi

hope this is the right place for noob questions

i'm struggling with this example:

Code:

$ find . -name temp -prune -o -print
from theunixschool.com

it means:
Find all the files except the ones under the temp directory.

shouldn't it be:

Code:

$ find . -path temp -prune -o -print

thx!

Keith Hedger · 05-03-2015, 05:37 PM

the command is correct -name specifies the name to prune, the prune option is awkward and counter intuative and you don't see it used much, best to experiment with it to see how it works also read the man page for find, it's only slightly confusing

johnywhy · 05-03-2015, 05:47 PM

thx for reply!

so you're saying it means: "prune a directory named temp".

correct?

then how would you prune files named 'temp'?

Quote:

Originally Posted by Keith Hedger

the prune option is awkward and counter intuative and you don't see it used much

glad to know i'm not the only one who finds it counter-intuitive! what is a less awkward method?

thx!

Keith Hedger · 05-03-2015, 05:58 PM

if you dont want certain files then you can use an expression like so

Code:

find /etc/dpkg -not -iname  "debian"

this will find all files except those named debian, using -iname the expression is case insensitive.
you can of course pipe the out put to another command for further processing.

Keith Hedger · 05-03-2015, 05:59 PM

as to your second part of the question i find piping the output of find to grep or sed gives much finer control of the output