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Find command and regex

 
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# 1  
Old 09-11-2014
Find command and regex
Hi All,
We have to copy some files from a source directory to a destination directory. We only have to copy the file if the filename is in a list of values.

We can use find command:
Code:
 
find . -type f -name '*_111.txt' -o -name '*_115.txt' ... -exec cp {} /tmp \;

But the list contains 30 filenames. Can we use a regular expression instead of -name?

For example, something like the following java regular expression:
Code:
 
[^\s]+_(111|115|116|120|130|153|198).txt

Thanks in advance.
# 2  
Old 09-11-2014
No, but you can use pattern matching:
Code:
find . -type f \( -name '*_11[156].txt' -o -name '*_1[23]0.txt' -o  -name '*_153.txt' -o -name '*_198.txt \) '-exec cp {} /tmp \;

Last edited by Don Cragun; 09-11-2014 at 09:02 PM.. Reason: fix parens
This User Gave Thanks to Don Cragun For This Post:
bartleby
# 3  
Old 09-11-2014
Why don't you just copy all files in the list and handle errors like "file not found"?
# 4  
Old 09-11-2014
Or generate the pattern for find:
Code:
findpat=""; sep=""
for pat in 111 115 116 120 130 153 198
do
 findpat="$findpat $sep -name *_$pat.txt"; sep="-o"
done
find . -type f \( $findpat \) -exec cp {} /tmp \;

@Rudi: the list is likely a subset of the files.
--
BTW the -name ... -o -name ... must be in \( \) because -a has higher precedence than -o and just -exec ... is short for -a -exec ....
Last edited by MadeInGermany; 09-11-2014 at 08:12 PM..
This User Gave Thanks to MadeInGermany For This Post:
bartleby
 
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