Tricky Deleting

[Derek Carter]

Eric Jensen wrote:

> <snip>
> Quick question, what is the difference of doing something like:
>
> `find stuff | rm -rf ` and `find stuff | xargs rm -rf `?

find stuff | rm -rf  -- this command will generate a list of all 'found' 
files and send that to STDIN of the rm command, the rm command will 
erase all file paths sent to it from STDIN.

find stuff | xargs rm -rf  -- this command will generate a list of all 
'found files and send that list to the xargs command which takes that 
list and runs the command
supplied with each member of the list (eg rm -rf stuff1, rm -rf stuff2)

so the biggest difference is the number of rm processes you're creating, 
one for the first command that deletes all the files, and one for each 
'found' file with the second.

> Some day this find stuff will stick around in my brain long enough for 
> me to stop asking questions like this here.  man find just ends up 
> confusing me even more. ;)  Thanks again.



-- 
-----
Derek Carter <goozbach at gurulabs.com>
Instructor
GuruLabs <http://www.GuruLabs.com/> Your source for linux instruction.