CODEWITHSUNDEEP
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Jonardan Cena
Jonardan Cena

Reputation: 383

Shell script to check whether the entered file name is a hidden file or not in RadHat Linux

How do i create a script to check for the file is hidden or not?

#!/bin/bash
FILE="$1"
 
if [ -f "$FILE" ];
then
   echo "File $FILE is not hidden."
else
   echo "File $FILE is hidden" >&2
fi

but it is unable to do so. Please help me.

Upvotes: 1

Views: 1016

Answers (3)

dan
dan

Reputation: 5251

The test command would be:

[[ "${file##*/}" == .* ]]

It's necessary to remove the path, to see if file name starts with .. Here I used prefix removal. It's the most efficient, but will choke if a file contains slashes (very unlikely, but be aware).

A full script should include a test that the given file actually exists:

#!/bin/bash

file=$1

[[ -e "$file" ]] && { echo "File does not exist: $file" >&2; exit 1; }

if [[ "${file##*/}" == .* ]]; then
        echo "Hidden: $file"
else
        echo "Not hidden: $file"
fi

You could also list all hidden files in a directory:

find "$dir" -name .\*

Or all not hidden files:

find "$dir" -name '[^.]*'

Depending on the task, it's probably better to use a list of hidden or not hidden files, to work on.

Also, by default, ls does not list hidden files. Unless you use -a.

Upvotes: 0

Swift - Friday Pie
Swift - Friday Pie

Reputation: 14688

You essentially have to check if filename starts with . (period).

filename=$(basename -- "$FILE")

Then you have to use pattern matching

if  [[ $filename == .* ]]
then
# do something
fi

Upvotes: 0

Barmar
Barmar

Reputation: 782166

Check if the filename begins with .:

file=$1
base=$(basename "$file")

if [[ $base == .* ]]
then echo "File $file is hidden"
else echo "File $file is not hidden"
fi

Upvotes: 1

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