CODEWITHSUNDEEP
bash
user8707725
user8707725

Reputation:

Bash script to identify empty items in directory

I'm trying to write a bash script to identify empty files within a directory. For ease of use, I plan on just saving it to the home directory and running it from there. Note that it to NOT be recursive. Trying to avoid the use of the find command as it can get messy. If you have a better suggestion than test, I am all ears.

I will say that I am fairly new to bash scripting and would normally do this in Python, but am looking to keep things consistent with what we do around here.

The output should be the list of any empty files and a counter. Below is what I have so far, but I am not returning empty files despite having numerous ones in the "test" directory.

fileCount=0
for item in *; do
if test -f "$item" && ! test -s "$item"
then
    fileCount=$((fileCount+1))
    echo $item
else
    continue
    fi 
done

echo "Number of empty files: " $fileCount

If I wanted to modify this to take an argument (user-specified directory), how might I go about this? Below is how I have modified it, but I believe I am having an issue with my variables.

 fileCount=0
 echo "Please enter a directory: " 
 read directory

 for item in $directory; do
 if test -f "$item" && ! test -s "$item"
 then
     fileCount=$((fileCount+1))
     echo $item
 else
     continue
     fi 
 done

 echo "Number of empty files: " $fileCount

Upvotes: 1

Views: 455

Answers (3)

Rod Elias
Rod Elias

Reputation: 746

Actually, find is very simple.

find . -type f -size 0 gives you all the empty files in the current directory.

find . -type f -size 0 | wc -l gives you the number of empty files.

This works even with hidden files.

If you want to list empty files only within the current directory, just add -maxdepth 1 option to find.

Upvotes: 2

user unknown
user unknown

Reputation: 36229

find PATH_TO_SEARCH -maxdepth -type f -empty | nl

example: 

find proj/mini/forum -maxdepth 1 -type f -empty | nl
     1  proj/mini/forum/resolv
     2  proj/mini/forum/five
     3  proj/mini/forum/0
     4  proj/mini/forum/FactorialComplexit.java
     5  proj/mini/forum/-temp.html
     6  proj/mini/forum/index.-temp.html

I can't see any messyness. Since in almost all cases, filenames don't span over multiple lines, while I have to admit it is possible, nl seems a good enough tool for measuring the number of empty files met.

Upvotes: 1

Barmar
Barmar

Reputation: 780879

break ends the loop, so you stop counting at the first non-empty file. You want continue, which goes to the next iteration of the loop.

Or you could just write:

if test -f "$item" && ! test -s "$item"
then
    fileCount=$((fileCount+1))
fi

Upvotes: 3

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