LinuxQuestions.org - DISCUSSION: Find command

- LinuxAnswers Discussion (https://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linuxanswers-discussion-27/)

- - DISCUSSION: Find command (https://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/linuxanswers-discussion-27/discussion-find-command-402154/)

DISCUSSION: Find command

This thread is to discuss the article titled: Find command

Quote:

Command your box from command-line-interface. This is the power of unix/linux & this is the power of find. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Find command is just like driving a car to the destination. If you can read & follow the instructions provided, you are destined to reach at proper address. Location director boardings at signals & landmarks are the inputs/options provided by the users/yourself & finally the roads are the hierarchy/paths to follow to reach the desired destination. For example : I had to reach rahul's home but i dont remember the exact address, but i had some clues like, it was on 94th street & it was a red colour building, further on there were two trees situated infront of his house. That was enough for me & indeed i reached his home.

Quote:

1. Find file with file name 'foo'

find / -name foo
find / -name fo*
-name : Pattern could be a exact file name or wildcard * can be used

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2. Find file with file name 'FoO'

find / -iname foo
-iname : Same as -name variable but the match is case insensitive.

Same way -lname & -ilname variable works.
-lname : File is a symbolic link whose content matches the pattern specified.
-ilname : Same as -lname variable but the match is case insensitive.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
3. Finding all 'conf' files at / or at mentioned path.

find / -name *.conf

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
4. Backing-up/copying all the conf files found in last example over to a seperate folder.

find / -name *.conf exec cp { } / \;
-exec : Executes command. The string { } replaced by the output of find command.
" \;" needs to be there as it tells the end of arguements provided to -exec variable.

A quick note on this use of -name ... be SURE that there's no files
that match the globbed pattern in the directory you invoke the command
from if you don't wrap the search-string in quotes.

E.g.. if you had the following directories in the local path

Code:

pg2xbase-2.3.2

pgaccess-0.98.8

pgadmin3-1.2.2

pgmanage-src

pgsql_session_handler.php

php

phpPgAdmin

php_sessions.sql

platform

pme-1.0.4

and you searched for

Code:

find . -name php*

you'd be getting the following (somewhat bewildering) error-message:

Code:

$ find -name php*

find: paths must precede expression

Usage: find [path...] [expression]

which won't happen if you do it like this:

Code:

$ find -name "php*"

In other words: the globbing of the wildcard by the shell will take
precedence :}

Cheers,
Tink

Please note, this Tutorial has now been updated. Points 22 onwards are new.

Sometimes we need to find the file in server which we do not know where exactly it is located:

Search and list all files from current directory and down for the string ABC:

Quote:

find ./ -name "*" -exec grep -H ABC {} \;
find ./ -type f -print | xargs grep -H "ABC" /dev/null
egrep -r ABC *

Find all files of a given type from current directory on down:

Quote:

find ./ -name "*.conf" –print

Find all user files larger than 5Mb:

Quote:

find /home -size +5000000c –print

Find all files owned by a user (defined by user id number) on
the system: (could take a long time)

Quote:

find / -user 501 –print

Find all files created or updated in the last five minutes: (Great for finding effects of make install)

Quote:

find / -cmin -5

Find all world writable directories:

Quote:

find / -perm -0002 -type d –print

Find all world writable files:

Quote:

find / -perm -0002 -type f -print
find / -perm -2 ! -type l -ls

Find files with no user:

Quote:

find / -nouser -o -nogroup –print

Find files modified in the last two days:

Quote:

find / -mtime 2 -o -ctime 2

finding files in a directory that are older than 3 days and deleting them:

Quote:

find /directoryname -type f -mtime +3 -exec rm {} \;

Multiple commands in find

Hi Amit,

Could you help me out, if i want to run multiple commands in find command with -exec option, is there any way out to do this ?

Thanks in Advance

Quote:

if i want to run multiple commands in find command with -exec option, is there any way out to do this ?

Use -exec to execute the shell program, and just put your multiple commands into that.
See my post here for an example.

Well, as long as this thread has been resurrected, I will add:

Use single quotes to prevent globing:

Code:

BAD:

find / -name *.conf

GOOD:

find / -name '*.conf'

Using xargs increases performance and can prevent problems caused by spaces in file names:

Code:

SLOW:

find /directoryname -type f -mtime +3 -exec rm {} \; 

FAST:

find /directoryname -type f -mtime +3 -print0 | xargs -0 rm -f