CODEWITHSUNDEEP
unix
alestark
alestark

Reputation: 9

Remove all files from a directory except those listed in a file

got a file like "index.txt" that contains a few lines of book titles like:

book 1.pdf<br>
book 1.opf<br>
book2.epub<br>
book3.opf<br>

and so more, 1 title = 1 line

Id'd like to do this thing in bash:

rm -rf from $dir IF $file IS NOT in index.txt

How I can do this?

Upvotes: 1

Views: 414

Answers (2)

Santosh A
Santosh A

Reputation: 5341

You can use the below command.

find <dir> -name "*" | grep -vFf index.txt | xargs rm -rf

find : List all the files in the specified directory
grep-vFf : Do inverse grep with input from the file (will list files that are not found in the input file. In this case it is index.txt )
xargs rm -rf : Delete each of the file that are not found in the list. This deletion list is obtained as the output of previous grep command

Edit:

When files names contain white spaces use the below command.

find <dir> -name "*" | grep -vFf index.txt |sed 's/^/"/;s/$/"/' | xargs rm -rf

sed would add quotes to all the files name.

Upvotes: 1

gman
gman

Reputation: 1272

you can remove the listed files in a txt file using

#!/bin/sh

while read line;
do
rm `echo $dir/line`
done<list.txt

Upvotes: 0

Related Questions