[Sussex] Excluding hidden files and folders with find command [WAS: Sussex Digest, Vol 387, Issue 1]

[Fay Zee]

On 20 September 2011 18:58, David Binderman  wrote:
> $ find /home/fay -type f -name '*~' -print | grep -v 'whatever
pattern you
> want' | xargs rm
>
> sounds close to what you want. Even closer might be
>
> $ find /home/fay -type f -name '*~' -print | fgrep -v '/home/fay/.'
| xargs
> rm
>
> Suggest test it out first, though.

> The method I've given, using xargs, can have anything like grep,
fgrep,
> egrep, sed, perl or
> awk after the find, to restrict the list of filenames. Powerful, I
find.

> I first met Unix 30 years ago - a lot of this regexp technology is
even
> older.

Thanks for the tip, David. I like the -type option, which narrows down
the search, but I can't get to grips with the xargs today. I looked
carefully through the Wikipedia article and also a step-by-step
tutorial, but I will need more time.

However, re. fgrep, I found this 

fgrep (grep -F in linux) is fixed or fast grep and behaves as grep but
does not recognise any regular expression metacharacters as being
special.

That could be worth looking into when i have the dots and slashes in
the path.

We haven't seen you at a moot recently ... do look out for the
upcoming talks.

 Best Regards,
Fay
East Grinstead Linux User Group
www.eglug.org.uk


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