CODEWITHSUNDEEP
zshmv
J2N
J2N

Reputation: 341

mv command created an executable rather than a directory

I recently attempted to move some files by running an -exec mv command with find (command linked below). When I did this, I mistyped the destination directory path (so the directory did not yet exist) and mv created what appears to be an executable instead of a directory? When I run "Get Info" one image renders and the file size is about the correct size for an image, but hundreds of files were supposed to be copied. Have I lost this data for good? Is there any way to get macOS to recognize this "executable" as a directory?

This is the command I used:

find . -type f -name "*.JPG" -exec mv {} ../../DestinationFolderName \;

Here's an image showing a successful mv into an existing directory, and what happened when I put a path to a directory that did not yet exist.

Image of a folder on the left and executable on the right.

Upvotes: 1

Views: 285

Answers (1)

Brian
Brian

Reputation: 162

Unfortunately "mv" to a name that doesn't exist is interpreted as a filename rather than a directory. So the OS has, one-by-one, copied your JPG file on top of each other. The resulting file is most likely whatever JPG happened to be the one it moved last (if you rename it to JPG extension you can check which one).

So, very unfortunately, you probably need to investigate a data recovery tool for MacOS quickly (and do so before you've done things that make more files on your disk, as much a possible). The "ghosts" of the files are for now at least mostly still present on your hard drive (as deallocated segments), but are back in the pool to be overwritten as you create new files (even when your browser creates temporary cache files, and things like that). It's a conundrum.

If you don't have a backup/time-machine of the files, the best thing to do is get a MacOS data recovery program QUICKLY.

VERY sorry not to have a happier answer.

Upvotes: 3

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