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Quick script to rename files

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# 15  
Old 11-16-2014
Quote:
Originally Posted by jonesal2
Thanks for all the replies, I wasn't expecting it to be that complex.

I sort of thought the script might simply search the filename string for the first underscore and delete it plus all the characters before it, then search for (what would then be) the third underscore delete it plus the next 8 characters (since the time stamp is always YYYYMMDD)?

Or am I being too simplistic?
Not at all.
There are several examples here which do exactly that; excluding and/or deleting.
Could you post your version?
# 16  
Old 11-17-2014
So I have tried sed:
Code:
sed 's/^[^_]* - //'

Nothing really happened so I escaped that

Then I tried the perl script rename
Code:
 rename s/_\.// *.jpg

Which remove the _ and the first letter of the surname to look like
Code:
xurname_firstname_y_20141115_OS_(z).jpg

So then I tried:
Code:
 rename s/*_\.// *.jpg

but got
Code:
Quantifier follows nothing in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/* <-- HERE _./ at (eval 1) line 1.

:-/
# 17  
Old 11-17-2014
Quote:
Originally Posted by Scrutinizer
Hi Don,

That pertains to the RHS of the pipeline, which can be executed in a subshell or in the foreground. The LHS is always executed in a subshell.

This can easily be checked:
Code:
for i in dash bash ksh zsh
do 
  shl=$i $i -c "{ u=1 ;} | { v=1;}; echo \"\$shl: \\\$u:\$u,\\\$v:\$v\""
done

Code:
dash: $u:,$v:
bash: $u:,$v:
ksh: $u:,$v:1
zsh: $u:,$v:1

This shows that ksh and zsh execute the RHS in the foreground. The RHS in the other shells and the LHS in all shells is executed in a subshell. In bash 4 there is a separate setting (not the default) that can be turned on so that the RHS is also executed in the foreground.

The process id within a subshell cannot be tested with $$. A subshell is a child process that inherits the environment of the parent shell, including the variable $$. Therefore in a subshell of the parent shell, $$ will represent the parent's $$.


Shell Command Language


The pid of a subshell can still be checked by starting a child process that is not a subshell and checking $PPID:
Code:
sh -c 'echo $PPID'

I used the following script to test:

Code:
for i in dash bash ksh zsh
do
  shl=$i $i -c "{ echo \"\$shl:LHS:\$(sh -c 'echo \$PPID')\">>tst.out;} | { echo \"\$shl:RHS:\$(sh -c 'echo \$PPID')\">>tst.out;}; echo \$shl:parent:\$\$ >> tst.out"
done

Code:
$ cat tst.out
dash:RHS:57607
dash:LHS:57606
dash:parent:57605
bash:LHS:57613
bash:RHS:57614
bash:parent:57610
ksh:LHS:57618
ksh:RHS:57617
ksh:parent:57617
zsh:LHS:57623
zsh:RHS:57621
zsh:parent:57621

Again this shows that the RHS of pipelines in ksh and zsh are executed in the foreground, but the rest are not..


Therefore using a pipeline in the file moving loop, earlier in the thread requires (2n+1) or (3n+1) processes including the ones for the mv command (depending on the shell that is used), while using a heredoc/string or parameter expansions leads to (n+1) processes.
Yes; you're absolutely correct.

Of course the standards allow every element of a pipeline to be executed in the current shell execution environment, but none of the current shells are implemented that way.
# 18  
Old 11-17-2014
Guys,

I have read through the posts as best I can, just a reminder that x, y & z represent variable number so can't be hard coded. One other thing which I should have mentioned is that OS could also be OD in some cases.

Thanks
# 19  
Old 11-17-2014
For a quick-and-save renaming, I would install "mmv"
and run
Code:
mmv "*_*_*_*_*_*" "#2_#3_#4_#6"

if the reference character is #, like in this man page.
If not available for your distro, download+compile mmv.c
These 2 Users Gave Thanks to MadeInGermany For This Post:
jonesal2 ongoto
# 20  
Old 11-17-2014
I think Scrutinizer's post#11 is a good starting point. Use a glob like ...*_O[SD]_*... and adapt / validate $first and $last against e.g. a date or so.
# 21  
Old 11-17-2014
Quote:
Originally Posted by jonesal2
So I have tried sed:
Code:
sed 's/^[^_]* - //'

Nothing really happened so I escaped that

Then I tried the perl script rename
Code:
 rename s/_\.// *.jpg

Which remove the _ and the first letter of the surname to look like
Code:
xurname_firstname_y_20141115_OS_(z).jpg

So then I tried:
Code:
 rename s/*_\.// *.jpg

but got
Code:
Quantifier follows nothing in regex; marked by <-- HERE in m/* <-- HERE _./ at (eval 1) line 1.

:-/
Gee, I can't possibly guess what might be wrong.

You told us you wanted to rename files whose names were of the form:
Code:
x_surname_firstname_y_20141115_OS_(z)

and we made suggestions based on that format. Note that the filenames in this format end with a ); not a ).jpg and that makes a HUGE difference in the attempts to limit the patterns and REs used to match just the files you said you want to process.

You could try this (which should work with your original file naming specification with or without a trailing filename extension):
Code:
#!/bin/ksh
for i in *_*_*_*_*_O?_\(*\)*
do	printf '%s__%s\n' "$i" "$i"
done | while IFS="_" read junk s f y junk o z empty old
do
	[ "$empty" = "" ] || continue # Protect against files with extra "_"s.
	echo mv "$old" "${s}_${f}_${y}_${o}_$z"
done

When run in a directory containing the files:
Code:
-rw-r--r--  1 dwc  staff    0 Nov 16 00:45 123_surname_firstname_y_20141115_OD_(456)
-rw-r--r--  1 dwc  staff    0 Nov 17 01:29 extra_x_surname_firstname_y_20141115_OS_(z)
-rw-r--r--  1 dwc  staff  642 Nov 15 12:36 problem
-rwxr-xr-x  1 dwc  staff  241 Nov 17 01:40 tester
-rw-r--r--  1 dwc  staff  147 Nov 16 00:43 tester2
-rwxr-xr-x  1 dwc  staff  146 Nov 16 00:47 tester3
-rw-r--r--  1 dwc  staff    0 Nov 15 12:36 x_surname_firstname_y_20141115_OS_(z)
-rw-r--r--  1 dwc  staff    0 Nov 17 01:29 x_surname_firstname_y_20141115_OS_(z).jpg

it produces the output:
Code:
mv 123_surname_firstname_y_20141115_OD_(456) surname_firstname_y_OD_(456)
mv x_surname_firstname_y_20141115_OS_(z) surname_firstname_y_OS_(z)
mv x_surname_firstname_y_20141115_OS_(z).jpg surname_firstname_y_OS_(z).jpg

If it displays the mv commands you want to run, remove the echo shown in red and run the script again to actually rename the files.

If you have other files in this directory that contain exactly six underscores and a pair of parentheses after the last underscore that you want to exclude, we can tighten up the pattern to avoid false matches (if you'll show us the format of the filenames we need to avoid). As written this string will let x, y, and z can be any strings of non-underscore characters.

(This script will use n+2 processes to rename n files.)
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