CODEWITHSUNDEEP
arraysbashfind
HattrickNZ
HattrickNZ

Reputation: 4653

How do I store the output from a find command in an array? + bash

I have the following find command with the following output:

$ find -name '*.jpg'
./public_html/github/screencasts-gh-pages/reactiveDataVis/presentation/images/telescope.jpg
./public_html/github/screencasts-gh-pages/introToBackbone/presentation/images/telescope.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/(6)Thin Ice.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/Snapshot.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/Map_Grass.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/(8)TheHunters.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/(2)Volcanis.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/(3)Trench wars.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/(8)BigGameHunters.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/(8)Turbo.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/(4)Blood Bath.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/(2)Switchback.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/Original/(6)Thin Ice.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/Original/Map_Grass.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/Original/(8)TheHunters.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/Original/(2)Volcanis.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/Original/(3)Trench wars.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/Original/(8)BigGameHunters.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/Original/(8)Turbo.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/Original/(4)Blood Bath.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/Original/(2)Switchback.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/Original/(4)Orbital Relay.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Maps/(4)Orbital Relay.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Bg/GameLose.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Bg/GameWin.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Bg/GameStart.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Bg/GamePlay.jpg
./public_html/github/StarCraft-master/img/Demo/Demo.jpg
./public_html/github/flot/examples/image/hs-2004-27-a-large-web.jpg
./public_html/github/minicourse-ajax-project/other/GameLose.jpg

How do I store this output in an array? I want it to handle filenames with spaces

I have tried this arrayname=($(find -name '*.jpg')) but this just stores the first element. @ I am doing the following which seems to be just the first element?

$ arrayname=($(find -name '*.jpg'))
$ echo "$arrayname"
./public_html/github/screencasts-gh-pages/reactiveDataVis/presentation/images/telescope.jpg
$

I have tried here but again this just stores the 1st element

Other similar Qs
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How do i store the output of a bash command in a variable?

Upvotes: 2

Views: 3087

Answers (2)

rici
rici

Reputation: 241811

If you have a sufficiently recent version of bash, you can save yourself a lot of trouble by just using a ** glob.

shopt -s globstar
files=(**/*.jpg)

The first line enables the feature. Once enabled, ** in a glob pattern will match any number (including 0) of directories in the path.

Using the glob in the array definition makes sure that whitespace is handled correctly.

To view an array in a form which could be used to define the array, use the -p (print) option to the declare builtin:

declare -p files

Upvotes: 2

glenn jackman
glenn jackman

Reputation: 246932

If you know with certainty that your filenames will not contain newlines, then

mapfile -t arrayname < <(find ...)

If you want to be able to handle any file

arrayname=()
while IFS= read -d '' -r filename; do
    arrayname+=("$filename")
done < <(find ... -print0)

echo "$arrayname" will only show the first element of the array. It is equivalent to echo "${arrayname[0]}". To dump an array:

printf "%s\n" "${arrayname[@]}"
# ............^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ must use exactly this form, with the quotes.

arrayname=($(find ...)) is still wrong. It will store the file ./file with spaces.txt as 3 separate elements in the array.

Upvotes: 3

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