Hello everyone,


I have a file name "foo goo.tar" on Linux and I want to rename it to newname. I am using the following command, but it fails. How to solve it,

mv foo\ goo.tar newname
mv.orig: when moving multiple files, last argument must be a directory
Try `mv.orig --help' for more information.


thanks in advance,
George

Are you using the bash shell?

This works, so I think you may have made a typo.

Thanks jschiwal,


Still not working, this is the output.

touch foo\ goo.tar
(no output)
mv foo\ goo.tar foo_goo.tar
mv.orig: when moving multiple files, last argument must be a directory
Try `mv.orig --help' for more information.

Any more ideas? How to check which shell is using?


regards,
George

To retrieve the current shell you can
also, can you try the following?
I am puzzled about what is mv.orig.

Thanks colucix,


Here is the output of echo $SHELL

echo $SHELL
/bin/bash

Here is the output of alias mv

alias mv
-bash: alias: mv: not found

Here is the output of mv.orig --help

mv.orig --help
Usage: mv.orig [OPTION]... SOURCE DEST
or: mv.orig [OPTION]... SOURCE... DIRECTORY
or: mv.orig [OPTION]... --target-directory=DIRECTORY SOURCE...
Rename SOURCE to DEST, or move SOURCE(s) to DIRECTORY.

Mandatory arguments to long options are mandatory for short options too.
--backup[=CONTROL] make a backup of each existing destination file
-b like --backup but does not accept an argument
-f, --force do not prompt before overwriting
(equivalent to --reply=yes)
-i, --interactive prompt before overwrite
(equivalent to --reply=query)
--reply={yes,no,query} specify how to handle the prompt about an
existing destination file
--strip-trailing-slashes remove any trailing slashes from each SOURCE
argument
-S, --suffix=SUFFIX override the usual backup suffix
--target-directory=DIRECTORY move all SOURCE arguments into DIRECTORY
-u, --update move only when the SOURCE file is newer
than the destination file or when the
destination file is missing
-v, --verbose explain what is being done
--help display this help and exit
--version output version information and exit

The backup suffix is `~', unless set with --suffix or SIMPLE_BACKUP_SUFFIX.
The version control method may be selected via the --backup option or through
the VERSION_CONTROL environment variable. Here are the values:

none, off never make backups (even if --backup is given)
numbered, t make numbered backups
existing, nil numbered if numbered backups exist, simple otherwise
simple, never always make simple backups

Report bugs to <bug-coreutils@gnu.org>.

Any more ideas?


regards,
George

The output of mv.orig --help is exactly the same of the mv command from coreutils and since the mv command is not aliased, I suspect you have a link in /bin as
anyway, this cannot be the problem unless mv.orig is a modified version of the mv command. You can try to investigate about this issue. In the meanwhile if you have the rename command, you can try something like
See man 1 rename for details.

Thanks colucix,


The rename command works! Cool!

I am interested to investigate what is wrong with mv command on my machine. Could you describe more deailed steps please?

How to check whether mv is the same as mv.orig?


regards,
George

I never heard of "mv.orig". What does "type mv.orig" say? Is it a command or an alias or a function?

It could be a function that calls mv but doesn't handle the arguments properly causing the argument to be passed to mv as two arguments. You could call mv like "/bin/mv foo\ goo.tar foo_goo.tar".

Maybe try this:

I suggest also to do a simple
We already discovered that it is not an alias, but the suggestion from jschiwal sounds right: it can be a function that does not handle arguments in the proper way.

Hi nx5000,


Here is the output, any more ideas to find the root cause why mv is not working? Thanks.

type mv
mv is /bin/mv


regards,
George

Hi colucix,


Here is the output of ls -l /bin/mv*

ls /bin/mv*
/bin/mv /bin/mv.2 /bin/mv.orig

It is appreciated if you could give us more ideas to find the root cause why mv is not working with file names containing space character.


regards,
George

Thanks jschiwal,


I am following your comments,

type mv.orig
mv.orig is /bin/mv.orig

Any more ideas to find the root cause why mv is not working on my machine with file names containing space character?


regards,
George

Also try: "file /bin/mv /bin/mv.orig"

Where does the mv.orig come from? I have never heard of it and from the looks of things it doesn't work.

If you have a /bin/mv command, is it a link to /bin/mv.orig?

I wonder if .orig stands for "original". It seems that something modified "/bin/mv" and saved "/bin/mv.org" as a backup. Find which distro are you using? Find out where these files came from and if they are valid.
I'm hoping that a hacker didn't recompile your "mv" command. I might just be blowing smoke but something just doesn't smell right.

If you are using an rpm based system you can run "rpm -qV coreutils" to validate the file. I don't know how you would validate a debian package. What is your system by the way? You should put it in your LQ Profile so that we don't have to ask if it isn't mentioned.

It may be better to validate against your CDROM/DVD installation package:
rpm -qVp /path/to/coreutils-6.9-43.x86_64.rpm
However, if you have had a security update for coreutils, it may flag some false positives.

Thanks jschiwal,


I have followed your comments, here is output of file command

file /bin/mv /bin/mv.orig
/bin/mv: ASCII text
/bin/mv.orig: ELF 32-bit LSB executable, Intel 80386, version 1 (SYSV), for GNU/Linux 2.2.5, dynamically linked (uses shared libs), stripped

Here is the output of rpm -qV coreutils,

rpm -qV coreutils
S.5....T /bin/chgrp
S.5....T /bin/chmod
S.5....T /bin/chown
S.5....T /bin/mv
S.5....T /bin/rm


Let me know if you need more information to determine the root cause. I am interested to learn from you how to determine such strange issue. :-)


regards,
George