topic Re: Deleting an archive with an space in Operating System - Linux

Deleting an archive with an space

Manuales — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 11:30:18 GMT

Hi ....
how can i delete a file which contains an space ?
For example: there is a file named
root@user1> ls -1
log commands.txt
name of programs.txt
book to learn spanish.txt
root@user1>
If i aply: rm log* it can not deleted
how can i delete them?

Thanks, Manuales.

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Jeff_Traigle — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 11:32:40 GMT

Put quotes around the file name:

rm "file name"

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Torsten. — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 11:32:49 GMT

Simply put the name in quotes, like

"the name.log"

should work.

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Stephen Keane — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 11:40:14 GMT

rm log[[:blank:]]*.txt

Will deal with more than one space, or tab between the "log" part of the name and the remainder.

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

James R. Ferguson — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 12:18:21 GMT

Hi Manuales:

A general variation of this problem is to handle a file with special, non-printing characters as well as embedded spaces. Here's one way to search-and-destroy those:

# cd filesystem
# find . -xdev name "bad*" -exec ls -li {} \;

(or):

# ls -ilb . #...in place of the above 'find'

Either the 'find' or the 'ls' alone will expose the inode number of the file in question. Now use it to delete the file, like this:

# find . -inum 152 -xdev -exec rm -i {} \;

REMEMBER that an inode number is only unique WITHIN a filesystem! Using an interactive 'rm' is always a safety net. The '-xdev' option of 'find' also insures that you do NOT cross mountpoints (filesystems).

Regards!

...JRF...

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Sanjay_6 — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 12:48:35 GMT

Hi,

Try some of the suggestion in this question posted in the forum before for a similar situation.

http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=953425

Hope this helps.

regds

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Kent Ostby — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 12:53:16 GMT

In the directory where the file exists, type:

ll -i

this will list the inode number in the first column.

Like this:

571217 -rw-r--r-- 1 kmo users 0 Jan 3 12:52 fred

You're file's number will be different then 571217 of course.

With this information, you type:

find . -inum 571217 -exec rm {} \;

Of course, you would replace the 571217 with your inum.

Oz

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Manuales — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 13:06:56 GMT

No, any of last recomendations worked.

do you know another one?

Thanks.

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

James R. Ferguson — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 13:14:36 GMT

Hi (again) Manuales:

What didn't work? They doing this (as I first suggested):

# cd /tmp
# touch "book to learn spanish.txt"
# ls -li /tmp/"book*"
# find . -xdev -name "book*" -exec ls -li {} \;

...either command shows me 152 as the inode number on my filesystem. Hence:

# find . -xdev -inum 152 -exec rm -i {} \;
./book to learn spanish.txt: ? (y/n) y

Regards!

...JRF...

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Manuales — Tue, 03 Jan 2006 13:21:13 GMT

Hi James, i was refered to Torsten, Stephen and Jeff answer ...
now, in this moment i'm verifying the others answers ...
thanks !!!

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Arturo Galbiati — Wed, 04 Jan 2006 04:13:02 GMT

Hi,
try rm -i *command*txt and confirm when asked.
probably rm log* doesn't run because the separator is not a speca but a non printable chars.
HTH,
Art

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Stephen Keane — Wed, 04 Jan 2006 06:10:50 GMT

If my recommendation didn't work, then you don;t have spaces between the words making up the file name.

try the following to see non-printtable characters ...

# ll | cat -v

you can match each non-printable character with a '?'

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Manuales — Thu, 05 Jan 2006 14:22:19 GMT

Hi ..!!!
i can't delete the file !!!

the name of the file is: "-sh proceso.log"

how can i do it??

please help !!!

Thanks !!!

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Tom Danzig — Thu, 05 Jan 2006 14:28:24 GMT

rm -- "-sh proceso.log"

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Jeff_Traigle — Thu, 05 Jan 2006 14:41:43 GMT

Or by per the example in the rm man page:

rm "./-sh proceso.log"

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

James R. Ferguson — Thu, 05 Jan 2006 14:46:16 GMT

Hi Manuales:

Once again, the method I posted is generally applicable to files with *any* special characters. This includes files beginning with "-".

You can also do:

# touch /tmp/-
# cd /tmp
# rm -- -

The "--" syntax says that there are no more switches to a command and what follows is an argument; in this case a filename.

By the way, in my earlies posts, above, I dropped the hyphen form 'xdev'. The 'find' should read:

# find . -xdev -name "bad*" -exec ls -li {} \

Regards!

...JRF...

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

James R. Ferguson — Thu, 05 Jan 2006 14:46:32 GMT

Hi Manuales:

Once again, the method I posted is generally applicable to files with *any* special characters. This includes files beginning with "-".

You can also do:

# touch /tmp/-
# cd /tmp
# rm -- -

The "--" syntax says that there are no more switches to a command and what follows is an argument; in this case a filename.

By the way, in my earlies posts, above, I dropped the hyphen form 'name'. The 'find' should read:

# find . -xdev -name "bad*" -exec ls -li {} \

Regards!

...JRF...

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Manuales — Thu, 05 Jan 2006 15:26:50 GMT

Thanks all friends !!!

it was worked with:
rm -- "-sh proceso.log"

Thanks !!!
Manuales.

Re: Deleting an archive with an space

Manuales — Thu, 13 Apr 2006 17:24:07 GMT

Hi Sanjay, thanks for link
http://forums1.itrc.hp.com/service/forums/questionanswer.do?threadId=953425

and Geoff Wild, thanks for link http://www.sas.upenn.edu/computing/help/Unix/special_char.html

Thanks, is very interesting this site !!!

:0D
Manuales.