Hello Geeks, In this post, we will learn about find command that is one of the important command in Linux. It can help you find anything you want to search in our machine.
In Linux, everything is in the form of files and find command can be used with a lot of options like name, permissions, modification/accessed time, matching string, finding a particular format file. Using the relevant option with find command can ease the task and you will get the results quickly.
find command is available on all the flavors of Linux. In this tutorial, we will learn examples of find command that a Linux System administrator or a Linux User should know.
Basic Syntax of find command
# find <path> <selection criteria> <action>Search Files using Name
1. List all the files in the current directory and sub-directories
Using find without any option will list all the files in the current directory and sub-directories.
# find
or
# find .
2. List all the files in any specific diectory
This will show all the files in that particular path specified after find.
# find /<path>
To list all the files (not directories) in pwd use below command
# find . -type f4. Find all the directories in your present working directory
This option will help you find all the directories in your pwd
# find . -type d
5. Find files using name in Current Directory
If you want to search for a file of a particular name. For example, to find “new.php” file in the current directory and sub-directories
# find . -name "new.php"6. Find files using the name in a specific directory
Specify the path after find to search in that particular directory.
# find /boot -name grub.cfg
7. Find file (s) in multiple directories
You can give multiple directories in the path.
# find /boot /etc -name grub8. Find file using name and ignoring case
It will show both lowercase and uppercase results, hence ignoring the case.
# find <path> -iname <file or directory>9. Find Directory using name
Specify the name of directory to be searched after -name
# find / -type d -name LinuxforGeek10. Find files with particular extension/format
This is very useful thing, in case you want to search for any particular file format example shell scripts ends with .sh, music formats are in .mp3, text files are in .txt
# find / -name "*.php"11. Using maxdepth for limiting the search to a specific directory
In case you want to skip huge trees of sub directories and limit your search to one or two depth.
# find /<path> -maxdepth 2 -name "search pattern"12. Find all the files other than mentioned type / Invert match
It will show all the results except the specified in selection criteria section.
# find /test -not -name *.php"
or
# find ./test ! -name "*.php"
13. Using combination of search criteria
It is possible to combine two search criteria by specifying name and including invert match as shown in below example.
# find /test -name 'abc*' -not -name '*.php' -not -name "*.sh"14. Using OR condition in find command
# find / -name "abc.txt" -o -name "linuxforgeek.txt"15. Search File names matching regular expression pattern
# find /test -regex ".*\.\(txt\|php\)$"16. Find all hidden files
# find ~ -type f -name ".*"Finding files based on Permissions, owner or group
17. Finding files with permissions
# find /test -type f -perm 077718. Finding files that not having 777 permissions
# find /test -type f -not -perm 0777
or
# find /test -type f ! -perm 077719. Find files with suid bit set
find /usr -perm /u=s
20. Find files with sgid bit set
# find /usr -perm /g=s
21. Find files with sgid bit set and 755 permissions
# find / -perm 275522. Find files with sticky bit set and 755 permissions
# find / -perm 175523. Find read only files
# find / -perm /u=r24. Find all the executables files
# find /test -perm /a=x25. Find all the files owned by a user
# find / -user john26. Find all the files owned by a group
# find / -group dbaFinding files based on modification date and time
27. Find files modified 10 days back
# find / mtime 1028. Find files accessed in last 10 days
# find /-atime 1029. Find files modified between 5 to 20 days
# find /-mtime +5 -mtime -2030. Find files changed in last one hour
# find / -cmin -6031. Files modified in last one hour
# find / -mmin 6032. Files accessed in last one hour
# find / -amin 60Finding files based on size
33. Finding file of a particular size
# find / -size 20M34. Finding files between size range
# find / -size +10M -size -50M35. Finding smallest and largest file
# find / -type f -exec ls -s {} \; | sort -n -r | head -536. Find empty files
find /tmp -type f -empty37. Find empty directories
# find /tmp -type d -emptyAdvanced operations: Performing action on the find output
38. List all the found files
You can easily list files of any size using find command. Below example lists the files of larger than 100 MB
# find . -size +100M -exec ls -lrth {} \;39. Find specific Files and Delete
Below example can be used to find all the mp3 files of greater than 10 MB and execute part will remove(delete) the same.
# find / -type f -name *.mp3 -size +10M -exec rm -rf {} \;40. Find files with specific permissions and chmod (change permissions) to 755
Below command can be used to find all the files with 644 permissions and the action part is to execute “chmod 755” on all the files found.
# find / -type f -perm 644 -print -exec chmod 755 {} \;
That’s all for this tutorial, Hope you have understood find command usage with given practical examples.
