Find

Internal

• Linux

Usage

Target Type

find . -type <type-identifier>

where the type identifier can be:

• f regular file
• d directory
• l symbolic link
• b block special
• c character special
• p FIFO
• s socket

Case Insensitive Search

find . -iname ...

Control Descend Depth

The upper and lower limit of the descend depth can be controlled with -mindepth and -maxdepth, as follows:

find . -mindepth n

Configure find to apply tests and action at levels equal or deeper than n. -mindepth 1 processes the content of the directory specified as argument and recursively the content of its sub-directories.

find . -maxdepth n

Configure find to descend at most n directory levels below the command line arguments. -maxdepth 0 limits the whole search to the command line arguments.

In order to access directory between an upper and lower depth limit, both -mindepth and -maxdepth should be used.

Time Constraints

Find all files modified less that 2 days ago

find . -mtime -2

-name Patterns

A pattern for file names with specific characters on specific positions can be specified with [...]:

find . -name *.[jw]ar

looks for *.jar and *.war.

Mac Detail

On Mac, the pattern must be specified between quotes:

find . -name "*.something"