how to search a file?

nesta · 01-31-2007, 07:26 AM

hi folks
i want to search for a certain file in all the folders and sub-folders?
what is the shell-script command that enables me to do that?
also if i want to change something in it too?

druuna · 01-31-2007, 07:38 AM

Hi,

If your system runs updatedb regularly you can use locate <whatever>. It does depend on a database that reflects the current situation.

If locate is not an option, you can use find. Find is a bit resource unfriendly.

find . -name "filenamegoeshere" -type f -print

The above command searches for a file (-type f) called filenamegoeshere and prints it. You can use wildcards (-name "*lenamegoesh*"). The command start looking from the directory you are in (the .(dot)). If you want to start from a fixed directory you can use this as well (find /home/user ......). Find is recursive.

colucix · 01-31-2007, 07:39 AM

See man find. A search based on the file name is

Code:

find . -name filename

This start the search from the current directory ".".
To execute some commands on the files, look at the -exec option.

Edit: beated from the more detailed druuna's post!

nesta · 01-31-2007, 09:24 AM

thanks for ur help but
i can get the file that i m searching about it using the find command as follows:
code:

PHP Code:



find . -name "changes.txt"

but now i want to replace a certain word in it with another string.
actually should i make it using sed or using -exec option of find command.

i have tried this on the shell but i got error:

PHP Code:



find . -name "changes.txt" | sed s/student/Engineerin

the error is:

PHP Code:



sed: -e expression #1, char 18:unterminated 's' command

thanks in advance

druuna · 01-31-2007, 09:38 AM

Hi,

Find with the -exec option:

find . -name "changes.txt" -exec sed -i 's/Student/Engineer/' {} \;

The change is done 'in place' (sed's -i option, only works in sed 4.*).

Find and xargs:

find . -name "changes.txt" -print | xargs sed -i 's/Student/Engineer/'

The last command is supposed to be faster, even though I like the first one better