Ubuntu – for loop in folders with \n character in their names

bashcommand linescripts

I have some folders with \n character it their names.

for example:

$ ls
''$'\n''Test'

Thats refer to a folder with Test name and a empty line before its name.

So when I run some scripts like this, in its parent directory:

while IFS= read -r d; do 
    rmdir $d
done < <(find * -type d)

It shows:

rmdir: failed to remove '': No such file or directory
rmdir: failed to remove 'Test': No such file or directory

Because it runs twice, once on \n and the another on Test, because the folder name has two lines.

So how can I solve this issue such that, script knows \nTest is just one folder?

Best Answer

You've only single command there, so it's sufficient to call find with -exec flag calling rmdir:

find -depth -type d -exec rmdir {} \;

Or use the -delete option as in find -type d -delete, but it won't work with non-empty directories. For that you will also need -empty flag. Note also, -delete implies -depth so that may be skipped. Thus another viable alternative that keeps everything as one process:

find -type d -empty -delete

If the directory not empty, use rm -rf {} \;. To isolate only directories with \n in filename we can combine bash's ANSI-C quoting $'...' with -name opption:

find  -type d -name $'*\n*' -empty -delete

POSIX-ly, we could handle it this way:

find -depth  -type d -name "$(printf '*\n*' )" -exec rmdir {} \;

It is worth mentioning that if your goal is removal of directories, then -delete is sufficient, however if you want to execute a command on directory then -exec is most appropriate.

See also

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