selectively tar based on date just the innermost directories of a single directory

rsiazon · 07-28-2009, 06:15 AM

I need help to selectively archive the subdirectories of a single parent directory in which said subdirectories have creation year-date 2008 and older. Thanks a lot.

zQUEz · 07-28-2009, 06:27 AM

You could locate the directories by using a find command such as:

Code:

find / -type d -mtime +365

and then pipe that into a tar command. Also adjust 365 to however many days since 2008.

neonsignal · 07-28-2009, 06:56 AM

I should first note that unix file systems do not have creation times. Instead, there are access, modify, and change times.

To archive everything in directory 'example' that has not been modified since the start of 2009:

Code:

touch -d "1 Jan 2009" date-mark
tar cf subset.tar `find example -maxdepth 1 \! -newer date-mark`

The '-maxdepth' parameter prevents the 'find' command from recursing through the subdirectories, and the '\! -newer' looks for anything with a modification date older than the date-mark file. And those are backquotes around the find command.

rsiazon · 07-28-2009, 08:55 AM

Guys...here's the situation...parent /school1 has subdirectories say /stud1,/stud2,/stud3 etcetera....parent /school2 has subdirs /stud1,/stud2/stud3 etcetera....same with parents /school3../school4 etcetera....I need to archive via tar only subdirs /stud(n) which have not been modified since 2008 and earlier...excluding the parents...sorry I'm a newbie..I'm not sure if I am stating the problem properly and clearly...thanks a lot...

neonsignal · 07-28-2009, 10:22 AM

So assuming the current directory is the one that contains school1, school2 etc:

Code:

touch -d "1 Jan 2009" date-mark
tar cf oldstudents.tar `find school* -maxdepth 1 \! -newer date-mark`

This creates a tar archive file of all the students who have not been modified in 2009.

rsiazon · 07-29-2009, 12:15 AM

Got it..! Maraming salamat sa tulong niyo! (Filipino for "THANKS A LOT FOR YOUR HELP!") ...God bless

Tex Siazon