MacOS – Copy files from Folder A to Folder B based on Text File C with bash

The 'Image from Folder' will use the existing ownership/permissions of the folder and files.

First off, is the disk image a read/write image? Are you able to add new files to it? If not, the instructions below won't work if it is read-only.

The permissions you've listed, "-rw-r--r--@", mean that the file is read and writable by the owner and readable by everyone else. The @ at the end means there are extended attributes to the file, which might include some kind of invisibility option. You would have to get a directory listing with -@ to show the attribute keys. For example, here is a listing showing an image that I manually set to be hidden.

$ ls -l@
-rw-r--r--@ 1 insom  staff  - 64832 Dec  6 18:56 FunnyImage.png
    com.apple.FinderInfo       32

If all your files also have a com.apple.FinderInfo attribute, use Terminal to change into the directory of the files and run the following command to unhide the files.

chflags nohidden *

Now, if your dir listing doesn't show the com.apple.FinderInfo attribute then they are not being hidden using this method but something else is going on.

Have you tried rebooting? What about copying the disk image to a different computer and mounting it?

The following two commands, used in a Terminal, can accomplish what you've asked, the first creating a destination hierarchical directory structure containing the *.mp3 files and the second command deleting the *.mp3 files from the source hierarchical directory structure.

Note: Make sure you have proper backups before using the second command as a mistype can be fatal.

Open Terminal.

By default Terminal opens to one's Home Directory so I'll use it as the example starting point and the Music directory as the source hierarchical directory structure.

This first command will make a copy of the Music hierarchical directory structure containing only *.mp3 files in the destination directory. In other words after the first command is run there will be a destination directory containing that same hierarchical directory structure starting at Music within the destination directory that contains only *.mp3 files and only the directories from the source that contain *.mp3 files. If a given source directory does not contain a *.mp3 file then that directory is not created in the destination directory hierarchical structure.

Note: Full command line extends out of view without horizontal scrolling.

find ./Music -name "*.mp3" -type f -print0 | xargs -0 -I '{}' /usr/bin/rsync -avR "{}" "./mp3 files only/"

Note: Full command shown on two lines for clarity:

find ./Music -name "*.mp3" -type f -print0 | \
xargs -0 -I '{}' /usr/bin/rsync -avR "{}" "./mp3 files only/"

When the above command finishes there will be a directory in my Home Directory named "mp3 files only" and within that directory there will be a Music hierarchical directory structure containing only *.mp3 files. Note: If the destination directory does not exist it will automatically be created.

Now that the *.mp3 files have been copied from the source Music hierarchical directory structure to the "mp3 files only" directory the *.mp3 files can be removed from the source Music hierarchical directory structure with the following command.

find  ./Music/ -name "*.mp3" -delete

That's it, the *.mp3 files along with their hierarchical directory structure have been copied to a new location and the *.mp3 files deleted from the source.