Hi All, In this Unix forum, i saw a msg from Gopalkrishna V titled "Deleting a file(Name) with spaces". I was just wondering how can I find files with spaces in a large directory and rename files by removing those spaces. Files can have multiple apaces,viz. "two space file" OR "double space". Thanx in Advance Sujan Banerjee

Should work with sh/ksh/bash: filename="file with many spaces" touch "$filename" mv "$filename" `echo "$filename"|sed 's/[ ]*//g'` Let me know if you have any questions.

Hi Nails, I dont seem to be getting much success with the code snippet that u gave in the above message. Here is a directory with files with spacing:- bash-2.03# find `pwd` -name "* *" /elite/prof/source/double space /elite/prof/source/file one /elite/prof/source/new file /elite/prof/source/dpuble space file Now Herez a script to rename files by replacing spacing with hyphen using code snippet that u gave:- bash-2.03# cat rnm.sh #!/usr/bin/ksh for file in $(find `pwd` -name "* *") do touch "$file" mv "$file" `echo "$file"|sed 's/ */-/g'` done Herez what happens on running the script:- ash-2.03# ksh rnm.sh mv: cannot rename /elite/prof/source/double: No such file or directory mv: cannot rename /elite/prof/source/file: No such file or directory mv: cannot rename /elite/prof/source/new: No such file or directory mv: cannot rename /elite/prof/source/dpuble: No such file or directory You have new mail in /var/mail/root (Instead some other junk-files are created) bash-2.03# ls -CF -f-i-l-e- -s-p-a-c-e- double space dpuble space file new rnm.sh* -o-n-e- double dpuble file one new file The reason as far as I can see is that we are unable to bind those filenames into a single entity(See below):- bash-2.03# for file in $(find /elite/prof -name "* *"); do echo $file; done /elite/prof/source/double space /elite/prof/source/file one /elite/prof/source/new file /elite/prof/source/dpuble space file Above output means all the words in filename are being read as individual entities. ANOTHER QUESTION:What's purpose of touch "$file" in above script as it is inadvertently creating all those junk files ?? I am clueless.Any Solutions?Thanx in Advance. Regards, Sujan

Hi Nails, I seem to have solved the issue with 1 of ur earlier posts. Here it is: bash-2.03# cat rnm.sh #!/bin/ksh find `pwd` -name "* *"|while read file do target=`echo "$file"|tr -s ' '|tr ' ' '-'` mv "$file" "$target" done bash-2.03# sh rnm.sh bash-2.03# ls double-space dpuble-space-file file-one new-file rnm.sh But this is one ghost system,Earlier target=$(echo "$file"|tr -s ' '|tr ' ' '-') because of shell dependency. But still u can comment on my earlier post. Regards, Sujan

OK, here are my comments: First, the touch command: filename="file with many spaces"touch "$filename" touch "$filename" simply creats the file I was using for the demonstration. I didn't think you'd use it in a script. I suggest you read the man pag e on touch. Second, as you've probably learned, never use the for command when processing commands that return output with spaces: for file in $(find . -print) do echo "$file" done The shell parses using with space which the default field separator. Use the while loop: find . -print|while read file do echo "$file" done Third, there is no reason to user the pwd command embedded in the find command: find `pwd` -name ... Above, this says to search the current directory which is no different than you the period: find . -name ... Fourth, your tr solution works, but I prefer this awk solution: find . -name "* *"|while read file do echo "$file" mv "$file" "`echo "$file"| nawk ' BEGIN {OFS="_"} $1=$1 '`" done

Hi Nails Thanx a lot for ur feedback. It was really enriching. Actually I was fooled into believing that u were using touch to bind the string into a single variable. Thanx and Regards, Sujan

filename="file with many spaces" touch "$filename" mv "$filename" `echo "$filename"|sed 's/[ ]*//g'` This script when I put in some shell and call that it does not work