Cygwin is a Linux-like environment for Windows<\/a>.\u00a0 It comes in handy when you’re at work, or at home, and your only operating system happens to be Microsoft Windows.\u00a0 Cygwin allows you to issue Linux commands in a console<\/strong> in Microsoft Windows.\u00a0 I find it easier to use than the DOS CMD prompt when I’m using a Windows OS.\u00a0 It’s a great way to get things done quicker, and can be scripted\u2014in a similar environment to a Linux Terminal.<\/p>\n So, let’s say you’re seasoned in the Linux shell.\u00a0 You’re now at work, using Cygwin, and you want to rename a lot of files based on their name matching a pattern of letters or numbers or both.\u00a0 This is where cygwin has some trouble.<\/p>\n By default, cygwin does not come with rename<\/strong> ability.\u00a0 The package util-linux is required<\/strong>.<\/p>\n Cygwin’s rename command renames files if you tell it the exact name<\/strong> of your target file.\u00a0 This is the same as the mv<\/strong> command. I’m no Cygwin expert, but this is the experience I’ve had.<\/p>\n In Linux, you can rename files using wildcards or pattern matches.\u00a0 Cygwin’s rename command cannot seem to handle regexes in the same way.\u00a0 I’ve tried a fair amount of googling to see why this command has limited behavior in cygwin.\u00a0 I haven’t found a usable solution or add-on to cygwin to overcome this limitation.<\/p>\n So, here’s a shell script that uses sed, mv, and find to overcome the limitation.\u00a0 I was unable to attach it, so I copied and pasted it below.<\/p>\n Please understand and accept the following disclaimer:\u00a0 YOU MAY USE & MODIFY THE SCRIPT.\u00a0 AUTHOR ASSUMES ZERO LIABILITY.\u00a0 SCRIPT INTENDED FOR USE IN CYGWIN WITHIN A WINDOWS OS. <\/em>SCRIPT COMES WITH NO WARRANTY, <\/em><\/span>USE AT YOUR OWN RISK.<\/span> <\/span><\/em>Thanks.<\/p>\n Ok, I’ve copied the script and saved it, how do I use it?<\/p>\n Here’s a way to store & use the script.\u00a0 This script is yours to use & modify as you wish.<\/p>\n Rename files in cygwin, overcoming a limitation Cygwin is a Linux-like environment for Windows.\u00a0 It comes in handy when you’re at work, or at home, and your only operating system happens to be Microsoft Windows.\u00a0 Cygwin allows you to issue Linux commands in a console in Microsoft Windows.\u00a0 I find it easier to use than […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,23],"tags":[48,50,55,35,38,57,49],"class_list":["post-773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-command-line","category-use-linux","tag-cli","tag-console","tag-cygwin","tag-find","tag-mv","tag-rename","tag-terminal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/773","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=773"}],"version-history":[{"count":45,"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/773\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":816,"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/773\/revisions\/816"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=773"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nylinuxhelp.com\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}#!\/bin\/sh\r\n# cygrename : A Program to overcome limitation of cygwin's \"rename\" function.\r\n# Author: Adam Teller\r\n#\r\n# Cygwin's \"rename\" doesn't work same way as *Nix \"rename\"\r\n# because it cannot use wildcards. So, what can we do?\r\n## Get the basename of the file if it matches search pattern.\r\n## If 4th argument is set, change file to that suffix.\r\n## else, match pattern within file name and keep same suffix\r\n#\r\n## Arguments: [search pattern] [replace pattern] [in suffix] [to new suffix]\r\n\r\nLIST1=$(find . -type f -name \"*${1}*\\.${3}\")\r\nif [ -z \"${LIST1}\" ];\r\n then\r\n printf \"Did not find any file matches, program will exit\\n\"\r\n exit 1\r\nfi\r\n\r\nfor found in $LIST1;\r\n do\r\n MATCHEDFILE=$(basename $found);\r\n NEWFILENAME=$(echo $MATCHEDFILE | sed -e \"s\/${1}\/${2}\/\");\r\n NEWFILENAMENOEXTENSION=$(echo $NEWFILENAME | sed -r \"s\/\\.${3}\/\/\");\r\n\r\n ## TEST if $4 has been set, it means want a new file suffix\r\n if [ -z \"${4}\" ];\r\n then\r\n printf \"$MATCHEDFILE :to be renamed as: $NEWFILENAME for files of type ${3}\\n\";\r\n mv $MATCHEDFILE $NEWFILENAME;\r\n else\r\n printf \"${NEWFILENAMENOEXTENSION}.${3} will get $4 as its suffix, \";\r\n printf \"and be renamed to ${NEWFILENAMENOEXTENSION}.${4} \\n\";\r\n mv $MATCHEDFILE \"${NEWFILENAMENOEXTENSION}.${4}\"\r\n fi\r\n done\r\n\r\n exit 0<\/span><\/pre>\n\n
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