[NTLUG:Discuss] "find -exec" -vs xargs -OR- subshells in -exec

[Robert Thompson]

> ..but I was so wrapped up in trying to make this a one-liner.

$ touch 1~1.foo
$ for i in `find . -name *~*`; do mv $i `echo $i | sed y^~^-^`; done
$ ls
1-1.foo
$

	Anything that can go into a shell script can go on the cli. Sometimes it's just easier to put it into a script (for comments, resuse, complexity, etc). Other times a one-off doesn't need it.

Robert Thompson


On Fri, May 26, 2006 at 11:57:44AM -0500, Richard Geoffrion wrote:
> Stuart Johnston wrote:
> 
> >Richard Geoffrion wrote:
> >  
> >
> >>I'm trying to rename a bunch of mangled files.  I want to replace all of 
> >>the tilde (~) characters with dashes (-).
> >>
> >>    
> >>
> >rename is just a perl script so you could probably copy it over to your 
> >system.  Or, move your mv and sed commands into a shell script and run 
> >that from find:
> >
> >  
> >
> on my Slack 10.0 system, it appears to be a binary file.  (It seems to 
> be completely missing in OSX)
> 
> >$ cat ren
> >#!/bin/bash
> >
> >mv $1 `echo $1 | sed y#~#-#`
> >
> >find . -name *~* -exec ./ren {}  \;
> >  
> >
> 
> And of course that worked.  At one point I had a passing idea to do 
> something like this..but I was so wrapped up in trying to make this a 
> one-liner.   I still don't understand the shell WHYs and WHEREFOREs as 
> to why the -exec command didn't work.  I'm sure it has to do with 
> starting a subshell under a subshell..
> 
> oh well. the evil deed is done and the mangled files have been demanglified.
> 
> THX!
> 
> -- 
> Richard
> 
> 
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