NAME
App::RegexFileUtils - use regexes with file utils like rm, cp, mv, ln
VERSION
version 0.03
SYNOPSIS
Remove all files with a .bak extension:
% rerm '/\.bak$/'Change the extension of all files from .jpeg or .JPG (any case) to .jpg
% remv '/\.jpe?g$/.jpg/i'Copy all Perl files to a different directory:
% recp '/\.p[lm]$/' /perl/libCreate symlinks to .so files so that the symlinks lack a version number
% reln -s '/\.so\..*$/.so/'DESCRIPTION
This distribution provides a version of rm, cp, mv and ln with a re (as in regular expression) prefix where the file sources can be specified as a regular expression, or the file source and destination can be specified as a regular expression substitution Perl style. The functionality that this provides can be duplicated with shell syntax (typically for loops), but I find these scripts require less typing and work regardless of the shell you are using.
The scripts in this distribution do not remove, copy, move or link files directly, instead they call the real rm, cp, mv and ln programs provided by your operating system. You can therefore use any options that they support, for example the -i option will allow you to interactively delete files:
% rerm -i '/\.bak$/'OPTIONS
In addition to any options supported by the underlying operating system, these scripts will recognize the following options (and NOT pass them to the underlying system utilities). They are prefixed with --re so that they do not interfear with any "real" options.
--recmd command
Specifies the command to execute. This is usually determined by Perl's $0 variable.
--reverbose
Print out the system commands that are actually executed.
--reall
Include even hidden dot files, like .profile and .login.
METHODS
These commands can also be invoked from your Perl script, using this module:
App::RegexFileUtils->main( $program, @arguments )
For example:
use App::RegexFileUtils;
App::RegexFileUtils->main( 'rm', '/\.bak$/' );CAVEATS
You will need to enclose many regular expressions in single quotes '' on the command line as many regular expression characters have special meanings in shells.
The underlying fileutils command (rm, cp, ln, etc) will be called for each file operated on, which may be slow if many files match the regular expression provided.
This was written a long time ago and the code isn't very modern.
Directories with a training slash may be ambiguous with a regex, so if you want to use a path as a destination instead of a regex, be sure you do NOT include the trailing slash. That is:
# use this:
% recp /^foo/ /usr/bin
# NOT this:
% recp /^foo/ /usr/bin/AUTHOR
Graham Ollis <plicease@cpan.org>
COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE
This software is copyright (c) 2012 by Graham Ollis.
This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as the Perl 5 programming language system itself.