Score:0

Ubuntu

UBUNTU commands to find file in a folder

padjee

10/12/23, 4:48 AM

I want to find files in a certain folder with certain extension, lets say finding ".sql" in "/backup-nfs". Later on, I will use this command on crontab to delete some files automatically.

I use 3 different methods and they give out different results :

Method 1 :

login as A USER.
go to /backup-nfs
type in ls -lah
Results are 14 files. Of course, this is correct.

Method 2 :

login as A USER.
go to /backup-nfs
type in : find . /backup-nfs/ -name "*.sql" -type f -ls
Results are 14 files (7 of them are duplicates, so essentially only resulted 7 files). Eg : file A, file B, ... file G, /backup-nfs/file A, /backup-nfs/file B,... /backup-nfs/file G

Method 3 :

login as A USER
go to root of that user
type in : find . /backup-nfs/ -name "*.sql" -type f -ls
Results are too many files. It searches the whole directory, not just /backup-nfs !

Question:

Why did Method 2 only result in just 7 distinct files? There are 7 other files, with size 0KB, that are omitted.
Why does Method 3 search the /backup-nfs and also the entire directory outside "/backup-nfs" even though I have specified to search to only "/backup-nfs" ?
What's the correct method? I do not want to delete other files that do not meet the criteria.

I tried on Ubuntu 12.04 (server) and 20.04 (non server)

253

1 + 4

server

command-line

find

Raffa

10/12/23, 4:59 AM

The `.` will translate to the current working directory … So you must not use it in method 3 and you don’t need to use it in method 2 … What do you mean by duplicates? Are there subdirectories in the search directory ? … Are you sure the release of Ubuntu is 12.04 ?!

padjee

10/12/23, 5:11 AM

Hi Raffa. I updated the question. Please kindly read the update. @Raffa

guiverc

10/12/23, 5:33 AM

Only supported releases of Ubuntu (*standard support*) are on-topic for this site. Ubuntu 12.04 LTS is EOL thus off-topic, and Ubuntu 12.04 ESM was in extended support and only supported by Canonical via Ubuntu Advantage thus also off-topic here. Refer https://askubuntu.com/help/on-topic https://help.ubuntu.com/community/EOLUpgrades https://fridge.ubuntu.com/2017/03/15/ubuntu-12-04-precise-pangolin-reaches-end-of-life-on-april-28-2017/

padjee

10/12/23, 6:31 AM

isn't it a general question, applied to all Ubuntu regardless of the version? @guiverc

Score:6

Ubuntu

exore

10/12/23, 5:47 AM

The problem is :

find . /backup-nfs/

You ask to search in . (the current directory) and also in /backup-nfs. If you want to search only in /backup-nfs just say it, no need to add the current directory.

find /backup-nfs

Answers:

No idea. You probably did not look right.
because you explicitly ask to search the current directory (.) that happens to be USER's home and /backup-nfs.
find /backup-nfs -iname "*.sql" -print0 | xargs -0 rm
or as @terdon suggests in a comment, use the -delete action directly
find /backup-nfs -iname "*.sql" -delete

Also note that you claim that ls - lah gives the correct result, this would mean that you have a folder named - and a folder named lah inside the folder /backup-nfs that together hold 14 files named "*sql". I seriously doubt that.

+ 6

padjee

10/12/23, 6:36 AM

isn't `-lah` an option for `ls` ? Here : https://www.rapidtables.com/code/linux/ls.html @exore

exore

10/12/23, 6:59 AM

`-lah` **is** an option. but "`-`space`lah`" are 2 arguments that are not options, thus regular arguments.

padjee

10/12/23, 7:14 AM

Yes..sorry for the typo. I just realize.. thanks @exore

terdon

10/12/23, 10:18 AM

No need for `xargs`, you can just do `find /backup-nfs -iname '*.sql' -delete`.

exore

10/12/23, 8:55 PM

Oh. great. I still use the old idioms I learnt years ago. this `-delete` action is even better. Thanks @terdon.

terdon

10/13/23, 11:32 AM

Yeah, the `-delete` is a GNU `find` thing, if you're coming from the UNIX world it won't be familiar.

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