I have a directory where some files contain the ^M special character in their filenames. (not sure how they got there, possibly related to editing them on Windows)

ls shows a question-mark in those filenames.
tab-completion shows a ^M instead of a question mark.

I'd like to get a list of all those files and delete them? How can I do that?

I've tried this:
ls *?.txt
ls *^M.txt
but both create errors

Thanks for your help!

escape the "^"

ls *\^M.txt

Thanks for the response, but that doesn't work. I get this error:

ls *\^M.txt
ls: cannot access *^M.txt: No such file or directory

I'm on Ubuntu 8, in case that matters.

I directly typed in "^M". Hitting CTRL+M just gives a new-line.

Any other ideas?

I just solved the problem by writing a PHP script that checks for "\r" in the filename. Here's the source in case anyone wants it.


<?php

// returns true/false if $file contains ^M
function file_contains_special_char($file)
{
if (strpos($file, "\r"))
{
return true;
}
else
{
return false;
}
}

$directory = "/write/a/directory/here/";

// create a handler for the directory
$handler = opendir($directory);

// open directory and walk through the filenames
while ($file = readdir($handler)) {

// if file isn't this directory or its parent
if ($file != "." && $file != "..")
{
if(file_contains_special_char($file))
{
if(!unlink($directory . $file))
{
echo "ERROR, delete failed for file $file\n";
}
}
}

}

// tidy up: close the handler
closedir($handler);

?>

A bit late, but for future reference:

ctrl-v, then press return - that'll insert you your ^M character