Find in specific directory linux

Find files in specific directories

I have a college exercise which is «Find all files which name ends in «.xls» of a directory and sub-directories that have the word «SCHEDULE», without using pipes and using only some of the commands GREP, FIND, CUT, PASTE or LS I have reached this command:

ls *.xls /users/home/DESKTOP/*SCHEDULE 

This shows me only the .xls files on the Desktop and opens all directories with SCHEDULE on the name but when it does it it shows me all the files on the directories insted of only the .xls ones.

I have tried find with the same command but the output is the same but shown with the find command syntax

Well, you obviously need to specify some flags for find to know what it’s looking for. I won’t spoil the fun here, because homework is supposed to teach you something. Read ‘man find’

2 Answers 2

Assuming that by «file» they mean «regular file», as opposed to directory, symbolic link, socket, named pipe etc.

To find all regular files that have a filename suffix .xls and that reside in or below a directory in the current directory that contain the string SCHEDULE in its name:

find . -type f -path '*SCHEDULE*/*' -name '*.xls' 

With -type f we test the file type of the thing that find is currently processing. If it’s a regular file (the f type), the next test is considered (otherwise, if it’s anything but a file, the next thing is examined).

The -path test is a test agains the complete pathname to the file that find is currently examining. If this pathname matches *SCHEDULE*/* , the next test will be considered. The pattern will only match SCHEDULE in directory names (not in the final filename) due to the / later in the pattern.

The last test is a test against the filename itself, and it will succeed if the filename ends with .xls .

Any pathname that passes all tests will by default be printed.

You could also shorten the command into

find . -type f -path '*SCHEDULE*/*.xls' 

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Find Files in Linux Using the Command Line

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When you have to find a file in Linux, it’s sometimes not as easy as finding a file in another operating system. This is especially true if you are running Linux without a graphical user interface and need to rely on the command line. This article covers the basics of how to find a file in Linux using the CLI. The find command in Linux is used to find a file (or files) by recursively filtering objects in the file system based on a simple conditional mechanism. You can use the find command to search for a file or directory on your file system. By using the -exec flag ( find -exec ), matches, which can be files, directories, symbolic links, system devices, etc., can be found and immediately processed within the same command.

Find a File in Linux by Name or Extension

Use find from the command line to locate a specific file by name or extension. The following example searches for *.err files in the /home/username/ directory and all sub-directories:

find /home/username/ -name "*.err" 

Using Common find Commands and Syntax to Find a File in Linux

find expressions take the following form:

find options starting/path expression 

• The options attribute will control the find process’s behavior and optimization method.
• The starting/path attribute will define the top-level directory where find begins filtering.
• The expression attribute controls the tests that search the directory hierarchy to produce output.

Consider the following example command:

find -O3 -L /var/www/ -name "*.html" 

This command enables the maximum optimization level (-O3) and allows find to follow symbolic links ( -L ). find searches the entire directory tree beneath /var/www/ for files that end with .html .

Basic Examples

Command	Description
find . -name testfile.txt	Find a file called testfile.txt in current and sub-directories.
find /home -name *.jpg	Find all .jpg files in the /home and sub-directories.
find . -type f -empty	Find an empty file within the current directory.
find /home -user exampleuser -mtime -7 -iname «.db»	Find all .db files (ignoring text case) modified in the last 7 days by a user named exampleuser.

Options and Optimization for find

The default configuration for find will ignore symbolic links (shortcut files). If you want find to follow and return symbolic links, you can add the -L option to the command, as shown in the example above.

find optimizes its filtering strategy to increase performance. Three user-selectable optimization levels are specified as -O1 , -O2 , and -O3 . The -O1 optimization is the default and forces find to filter based on filename before running all other tests.

Optimization at the -O2 level prioritizes file name filters, as in -O1 , and then runs all file-type filtering before proceeding with other more resource-intensive conditions. Level -O3 optimization allows find to perform the most severe optimization and reorders all tests based on their relative expense and the likelihood of their success.

Command	Description
-O1	(Default) filter based on file name first.
-O2	File name first, then file type.
-O3	Allow find to automatically re-order the search based on efficient use of resources and likelihood of success.
-maxdepth X	Search current directory as well as all sub-directories X levels deep.
-iname	Search without regard for text case.
-not	Return only results that do not match the test case.
-type f	Search for files.
-type d	Search for directories.

Find a File in Linux by Modification Time

The find command contains the ability to filter a directory hierarchy based on when the file was last modified:

find / -name "*conf" -mtime -7 find /home/exampleuser/ -name "*conf" -mtime -3 

The first command returns a list of all files in the entire file system that end with the characters conf and modified in the last seven days. The second command filters exampleuser user’s home directory for files with names that end with the characters conf and modified in the previous three days.

Use grep to Find a File in Linux Based on Content

The find command can only filter the directory hierarchy based on a file’s name and metadata. If you need to search based on the file’s content, use a tool like grep . Consider the following example:

find . -type f -exec grep "example" '<>' \; -print 

This searches every object in the current directory hierarchy ( . ) that is a file ( -type f ) and then runs the command grep «example» for every file that satisfies the conditions. The files that match are printed on the screen ( -print ). The curly braces ( <> ) are a placeholder for the find match results. The <> are enclosed in single quotes ( ‘ ) to avoid handing grep a malformed file name. The -exec command is terminated with a semicolon ( ; ), which should be escaped ( \; ) to avoid interpretation by the shell.

How to Find and Process a File in Linux

The -exec option runs commands against every object that matches the find expression. Consider the following example:

find . -name "rc.conf" -exec chmod o+r '<>' \; 

This filters every object in the current hierarchy ( . ) for files named rc.conf and runs the chmod o+r command to modify the find results’ file permissions.

The commands run with the -exec are executed in the find process’s root directory. Use -execdir to perform the specified command in the directory where the match resides. This may alleviate security concerns and produce a more desirable performance for some operations.

The -exec or -execdir options run without further prompts. If you prefer to be prompted before action is taken, replace -exec with -ok or -execdir with -okdir .

How to Find and Delete a File in Linux

To delete the files that end up matching your search, you can add -delete at the end of the expression. Do this only when you are positive the results will only match the files you wish to delete.

In the following example, find locates all files in the hierarchy starting at the current directory and fully recursing into the directory tree. In this example, find will delete all files that end with the characters .err :

More Information

You may wish to consult the following resources for additional information on this topic. While these are provided in the hope that they will be useful, please note that we cannot vouch for the accuracy or timeliness of externally hosted materials.

This page was originally published on Monday, October 25, 2010.

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