How to use Bash array of globs with find?

Question

I have an array of globs that I want to feed to find.

My array is:

arr=('a*.txt' 'b[2-5].sh' 'ab?.doc')

Here what i tried:

find . -type f -name '${arr[@]}'

Here our array may contain many elements! Thanks for your response!

Fravadona · Accepted Answer · 2022-04-11 20:35:32Z

5

The way to search for multiple glob patterns with find isn't as straightforward as find -name "${arr[@]}"; you need something equivalent to:

find '(' -name 'a*.txt' -o -name 'b[2-5].sh' -o -name 'ab?.doc' ')'

^{note: the parenthesis aren't mandatory in your case but you'll need them for adding other operands like -type f}

That said, if your starting point is a bash array containing your globs, then you could build the arguments of find like this:

arr=('a*.txt' 'b[2-5].sh' 'ab?.doc')

names=()
for glob in "${arr[@]}"
do
    [[ $names ]] && names+=( -o )
    names+=(-name "$glob")
done

find '(' "${names[@]}" ')'

edited Apr 11, 2022 at 20:35

answered Apr 10, 2022 at 14:44

Fravadona

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1 Comment

Gordon Davisson Over a year ago

Nice. I'd recommend initializing names before the loop to make sure it starts empty, with names=().

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