topic Re: find command not working correctly in Operating System - HP-UX

find command not working correctly

Mike Ingram_1 — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 23:20:21 GMT

Hi All,

I noticed that the /usr/tmp directory was deleted - this is a link to /var/tmp. I eventually found that a cron job was deleting it.
The cron job was simply "find /usr/tmp -mtime +1 -exec rm {} \;"
Not only was the /usr/tmp directory deleted but also the files in the directory were not deleted as expected.
The only way I could get this to work properly was to do the find command against the "base" directory (/var/tmp) instead.

So my question is simply, is this normal behaviour or is there a bug in the system. I am running HP-UX 11.23

Thanks.

Re: find command not working correctly

Arunvijai_4 — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 23:26:32 GMT

Hi Mike,

/var/tmp is required for some applications to work properly. So, dont attempt to delete it.

-Arun

Re: find command not working correctly

RAC_1 — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 23:31:11 GMT

The command is fine. It should delete files in /var/tmp that have mtime more than a day old. What exactly was deleted and what not?

Re: find command not working correctly

Mike Ingram_1 — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 23:35:34 GMT

Hi RAC,

As I said originally, the command "find /usr/tmp -mtime +1 -exec rm {} \;" deletes the /usr/tmp link and does not delete the files in the directory.
But if I run the command "find /var/tmp -mtime +1 -exec rm {} \;", it works correctly.
/usr/tmp is standard on 11.23 and is a link to /var/tmp

Cheers.

Re: find command not working correctly

RAC_1 — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 23:41:29 GMT

I think you need to add -follow to find command. It will follow a link then.
man find for details.

Re: find command not working correctly

Mike Ingram_1 — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 23:44:24 GMT

Hi RAC,

I'll check it out and update later.

Thanks.

Re: find command not working correctly

Darrel Louis — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 23:45:12 GMT

Mike

What happens if you add the option
"-type f" to your command.

Darrel

Re: find command not working correctly

Mike Ingram_1 — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 23:48:03 GMT

Hi Darrel,

I haven't tried!!
All I tried was changing the /usr/tmp to /var/tmp in the find command and it worked correctly.

Cheers

Re: find command not working correctly

Mike Ingram_1 — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 20:55:41 GMT

Hi,

I tried the "-type l" and "-follow" args to the find command and it makes no difference.
The link directory is removed and therefore the files in the directory are left behind.

Is this a bug or am I doing something stupid?
Has anyone else had this problem?

Cheers.

Re: find command not working correctly

RAC_1 — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 22:48:19 GMT

I tested it on 11.23 and had no problems.
My setup is as follows.
/usr/tmp link to /var/tmp which is again a link to /tmp
I used following command.
find /usr/tmp -follow -mtime +1
What exact command you are using now?

Re: find command not working correctly

Mike Ingram_1 — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 22:55:06 GMT

Hi RAC,

If I run the command "find /usr/tmp -follow -mtime +1" it displays correctly.
The problem is when I run the command "find /usr/tmp -follow -mtime +1 -exec rm {} \;".
It deletes the /usr/tmp directory!!

Cheers.

Re: find command not working correctly

RAC_1 — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 23:01:45 GMT

What if you add -type f

Re: find command not working correctly

Patrick Wallek — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 23:03:18 GMT

You probably really should add a '-type f' (that is 'f' as in 'f'ile) to your command. That way it won't delete the link.

find /usr/tmp -type f -follow -mtime +1 -exec rm {} \;

Re: find command not working correctly

Mike Ingram_1 — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 23:10:31 GMT

Thanks Patrick,

Your command certainly doesn't delete the /usr/tmp directory, but unfortunately it also doesn't delete any matching files in the directory.
If I use your command, and change the /usr/tmp to /var/tmp, then the matching files in the directory do get deleted.

The "catch" lies in the fact that the directory /usr/tmp is a link to /var/tmp.

Cheers.

Re: find command not working correctly

RAC_1 — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 23:19:55 GMT

Is /var/tmp link to /tmp?

Re: find command not working correctly

Mike Ingram_1 — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 23:27:44 GMT

Hi RAC,

No, /var/tmp is a directory "on it's own" - not a link.

[root@lando:/var]# ls -l | grep tmp
drwxrwxrwt 6 root root 8192 Apr 13 14:05 tmp

[root@lando:/usr]# ls -l | grep tmp
lrwxrwxrwt 1 root sys 8 Feb 24 14:06 tmp -> /var/tmp

Cheers.

Re: find command not working correctly

RAC_1 — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 23:33:56 GMT

also, how about ading -depth to find command?

find /usr/tmp -depth -follow -mtime +1

Re: find command not working correctly

Arturo Galbiati — Thu, 13 Apr 2006 05:19:12 GMT

Hi Mike,
try adding / at the end of the dire name:
find /usr/tmp/ -mtime +1 -exec rm {} \;

in this way find should remove the file in the directory and not the link

HTH,
Art

Re: find command not working correctly

Mike Ingram_1 — Thu, 13 Apr 2006 08:09:17 GMT

Hi Art,

No, that didn't make any difference!
Same results - /usr/tmp directory deleted.

Cheers.

Re: find command not working correctly

Patrick Wallek — Thu, 13 Apr 2006 08:18:40 GMT

Well, my solution would be to use the correct directory name. Since /usr/tmp is a link to /var/tmp, just use /var/tmp in the find command.

I believe /usr/tmp is a "transition link", which means it was originally provided for compatibility reasons in the HP-UX 9.x to HP-UX 10.x transition. Since it is a transition link , anything referencing /usr/tmp really should be changed to /var/tmp. Why? Because it is entirely possible that at some point in time all the transition links will go away.

They have been around since HP-UX 10.x came out, one would hope that most people have started using the new directory layouts by now.

By the way, you can get a list of all 'transition links' on your system with the '/opt/upgrade/bin/tllist' command.