Linux Shell – How to Rename Files with Spaces

bashlinuxshell

I named a number of files with spaces in them, and I want to replace the space with _. However, every time I write a command in the shell with the file name (eg Spring 2011), the shell doesn't recognize the file or directory.

What can I do about this? Is there any way to use the unicode character for a space?

Best Answer

Escape the space, e.g. Spring\ 2011, or use quotes, e.g. 'Spring 2011'. In the future, it's typically a bad idea to use file names with spaces in them on any *NIX.

If you've got rename, you can use this:

rename ' ' '_' [filenames...]

Related Solutions

Linux – How to Rename Using Parameters and Spaces

Maybe you need to just put quotes around whole destination path? E.g.

$ touch test
$ a=one
$ b=two
$ mv "test" "$a $b"
$ ls -la
total 8
-rw-r--r--  1 whitequark whitequark    0 2010-01-27 01:21  
-rw-r--r--  1 whitequark whitequark    0 2010-01-27 01:20   
drwxr-xr-x  2 whitequark whitequark 4096 2010-01-27 01:21 .
drwxr-xr-x 80 whitequark whitequark 4096 2010-01-27 01:16 ..
-rw-r--r--  1 whitequark whitequark    0 2010-01-27 01:21 one two

Bash Shell Scripting – How to iterate through directories, and copy and rename files

find /hosted -maxdepth 1 -name "partner*" -type d | while read -r dir
do
    cp "${dir}/logo.png" "/partners/$(basename ${dir}).png"
done

find /hosted -maxdepth 1 -name "partner*" -type d | while read -r dir
do
    cp "${dir}/logo.png" "/partners/${dir##*/}.png"
done

Best Answer

Related Solutions

Linux – How to Rename Using Parameters and Spaces

Bash Shell Scripting – How to iterate through directories, and copy and rename files

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