pipeline
find
Recursively walks directories evaluating expressions on each entry. Combines discovery with actions like exec or delete.
find [PATH...] [EXPRESSION]Common flags
| Flag | Purpose |
|---|---|
| -name | Match filename by glob (case sensitive) |
| -iname | Match filename by glob, case insensitive |
| -type | Filter by type: f (file), d (dir), l (symlink) |
| -mtime | Match by modification age in days (+N older, -N newer) |
| -size | Match by size (e.g. +100M, -1k) |
| -exec | Run a command on each match (terminate with \; or +) |
| -print0 | Output NUL-separated paths, safe for xargs -0 |
| -maxdepth | Limit recursion depth |
Examples
find . -name '*.log' -type fFind all log files below the cwd
find /var/log -mtime +7 -deleteDelete files older than 7 days
find . -type f -size +100MFind files larger than 100 MB
find . -name '*.pyc' -print0 | xargs -0 rmSafely delete matches whose names may contain spaces
Gotcha
Expressions like -name '*.log' must be quoted so the shell does not expand the glob before find sees it.
Related commands
xargs
Builds and runs command lines from standard input. Bridges producers like find or grep to per-item actions efficiently.
grep
Searches text for lines matching a regular expression. Central to log analysis and pipeline filtering.
rm
Removes files and, with -r, directory trees. Deletions are immediate and not recoverable from the shell.