Glob() - Revision history

Christoph: /* See also */

2012-06-16T01:43:57Z

‎See also

Christoph: /* See also */

2012-06-16T01:24:11Z

‎See also

Christoph at 04:15, 14 April 2012

2012-04-14T04:15:10Z

Christoph at 23:49, 19 January 2009

2009-01-19T23:49:35Z

Christoph at 10:18, 19 February 2007

2007-02-19T10:18:23Z

Christoph at 05:29, 19 February 2007

2007-02-19T05:29:03Z

New page

{{lowercase|title=glob()}}
'''glob()''' is a Unix library function that expands file names using a pattern matching notation reminiscent of [[regular expression]] syntax but without the expressive power of true regular expressions. The word "glob" is also used as a noun when discussing a particular pattern, e.g. "''use the glob *.log to match all those log files''".

The term '''glob''' is now used to refer more generally to limited pattern matching facilities of this kind in other contexts. Larry Wall's ''Programming Perl'' discusses ''glob'' in the context of the [[Perl]] language. Similarly, [[Tcl]] contains both true regular expression matching facilities and a more limited kind of pattern matching often described as globbing.

==Glob metacharacters==
* # match zero or more characters
? # match one character
[] # group characters

==Examples==
''Note: Globs must match the entire filename, not just part of it (unlike regular expressions). By default in [[bash]], dot-files (e.g. <code>~/.bashrc</code>) are not returned.''

* Match anything
*
* Match anything with a full stop in it
*.*
* Match anything three characters long
???
* Match anything that starts with 'bar' and ends in .txt
bar*.txt
* Match any capital letter
[A-Z]
* Match any single character that is between the brackets (i.e. b, a, or r):
[bar]
* Match anything that starts with A, B, or C, in either case
[ABCabc]*
* Match any single character that is ''not'' between the brackets
[^bar]
* Copy all '<code>dsc0001.jpg</code>', '<code>dsc0002.jpg</code>', etc. files to <code>tmp/</code> dir:
cp dsc????.jpg tmp/
* List all files in <code>/usr/bin</code> starting with 'k' or 'x':
ls /usr/bin/[kx]*

Newer shells usually support extended glob capabilities. If <code>extglob</code> is enabled (<tt>shopt -s extglob</tt>), [[bash]] allows constructs like
rm !(*.c|*.h)
to delete all files except <code>.c</code> and <code>.h</code>.

To match dot-files in Bash, enable the <code>dotglob</code> option.

==See also==
* [[regular expression]]
* [[wildmat]]

[[Category:Scripting languages]]

@@ Line 67: / Line 67: @@
 * [[wildmat]]
 * [http://zsh.sourceforge.net/Guide/zshguide05.html#l135 zsh] &mdash; provides a '''lot''' of extended globbing features.
 ==External links==

← Older revision		Revision as of 10:18, 19 February 2007
Line 38:		Line 38:

	To match dot-files in Bash, enable the <code>dotglob</code> option.		To match dot-files in Bash, enable the <code>dotglob</code> option.
		+
		+	===Using glob with rename===
		+	Given the files <code>foo1, ..., foo9, foo10, ..., foo278</code>, the following two commands
		+	rename foo foo0 foo?
		+	rename foo foo0 foo??
		+	will turn them into <code>foo001, ..., foo009, foo010, ..., foo278</code>.

	==See also==		==See also==

@@ Line 44: / Line 44: @@
 * List all files in <code>/usr/bin</code> starting with 'k' or 'x':
   ls /usr/bin/[kx]*
 * List all non PDF and [[PostScript]] files in the current directory:
   ls -la !(*.p@(df|s))
@@ Line 64: / Line 66: @@
 * [[regular expression]]
 * [[wildmat]]
 [[Category:Scripting languages]]

@@ Line 8: / Line 8: @@
   ?  # match one character
   [] # group characters
 ==Examples==
@@ Line 32: / Line 44: @@
 * List all files in <code>/usr/bin</code> starting with 'k' or 'x':
   ls /usr/bin/[kx]*
 Newer shells usually support extended glob capabilities. If <code>extglob</code> is enabled (<tt>shopt -s extglob</tt>), [[bash]] allows constructs like