Recursive move / copy / delete ?

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Level 1

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Recursive move / copy / delete ?

How can I move/copy/delete files of type recursively?

Say I have 100 nested folders with JPG's and other files scattered throughout. I want to copy just the JPG's to a new location keeping the same folder structure.

In unix, you can do something like 'cp -r *.jpg <destination>'
Windows is similar, 'xcopy /s *.jpg <destination>'

I guess since it's just the BSD core, the cp command doesn't have the -r feature.

A solution using Terminal or Finder will do!

Thanks!

iMac Mac OS X (10.4.8)

iMac, Mac OS X (10.4.8)

Posted on Jan 25, 2007 3:34 AM

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Answer 1

Jan 25, 2007 3:48 AM in response to Coldburn

The -r switch works fine for recursive actions using the cp, mv and rm commands under OS X.

I use it all the time.

For example:
cp -r test test_new

Will copy the folder 'test' including all subdirectories and files to the folder 'test_new'.

rm -r test
Will remove all content within the 'test' folder.

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Answer 2

Mitch

Level 4

1,346 points

Jan 25, 2007 3:48 AM in response to Coldburn

Hi Coldburn,

If you want to use the terminal try to man the cp command.

Mitch

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Answer 3

Coldburn Author

Level 1

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Jan 25, 2007 6:57 AM in response to Rich Fleming

Really?!? I get the 'usage' syntax..

$ cp -r <path>/*.jpg ~/NewPictures
usage: cp [-R [-H | -L | -P]] [-f | -i | -n] [-pv] src target
cp [-R [-H | -L | -P]] [-f | -i | -n] [-pv] src1 ... srcN directory

I ended up just doing it on the PC.

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Answer 4

Coldburn Author

Level 1

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Jan 25, 2007 7:01 AM in response to Mitch

The (man)ual was the first thing I checked when it didn't work. There's nothing written about the option -r other than it's, "... strongly discouraged, as it does not correctly copy special files..."

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Answer 5

Jan 25, 2007 11:00 AM in response to Coldburn

I decided to fool around with this, here's the command that I got to work:

find /Users/francine/Ttest -name *.png -exec cp '{}' /Users/francine/Desktop/screens/ \;

It copied 55 png files from the folder Ttest and its numerous sub-folders into the folder screens. I was a bit surprised that it took perhaps 5 seconds to do this (I hadn't thought there were all that many png files in the Ttest sub-folders).

BTW, plain old cp did preserve the resources forks too. Guess that really has been fixed.
Francine

Francine
Schwieder

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