rename
I want to go over linux rename command very quickly. It’s a simple command but I used to find it tricky and unintuitive.
The man rename output examples of foo and bar are freaking cryptic.
So I want to show some real world examples of rename
Let’s do a directory listing…
[leo@localhost rename_example_dir]$ ls -l total 1872 -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 845805 2008-01-16 20:36 P1010591.JPG -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 914240 2008-01-16 20:36 P1010624.JPG -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 38167 2008-01-16 20:35 Picture 11.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 29726 2008-01-16 20:35 Picture 16.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 25545 2008-01-16 20:35 Picture 21.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 23886 2008-01-16 20:35 Picture 22.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 14736 2008-01-16 20:35 Picture 3.jpg
Great. Now, let’s change those filenames..
[leo@localhost rename_example_dir]$ rename 'Picture ' 'PICTURE_' ./Pictu* [leo@localhost rename_example_dir]$ ls -l total 1872 -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 845805 2008-01-16 20:36 P1010591.JPG -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 914240 2008-01-16 20:36 P1010624.JPG -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 38167 2008-01-16 20:35 PICTURE_11.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 29726 2008-01-16 20:35 PICTURE_16.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 25545 2008-01-16 20:35 PICTURE_21.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 23886 2008-01-16 20:35 PICTURE_22.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 14736 2008-01-16 20:35 PICTURE_3.jpg
Ok, how about we match up the file extensions too..
[leo@localhost rename_example_dir]$ rename JPG jpg ./* [leo@localhost rename_example_dir]$ ls -l total 1872 -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 845805 2008-01-16 20:36 P1010591.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 914240 2008-01-16 20:36 P1010624.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 38167 2008-01-16 20:35 PICTURE_11.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 29726 2008-01-16 20:35 PICTURE_16.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 25545 2008-01-16 20:35 PICTURE_21.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 23886 2008-01-16 20:35 PICTURE_22.jpg -rw-rw-r-- 1 leo leo 14736 2008-01-16 20:35 PICTURE_3.jpg
Now let’s talk about what the heck happened.
The command is..
rename $takeout $putin $towhatfiles
First argument is what you do not want there, second argument is what you want to replace it with, third argument is a list of files, you can use wildcards and all the other freaky unix filematch operators.
