Linux Shells by Example

xargs—constructs an argument list(s) and executes a command

xargs [ flags ] [ command [ initial–arguments ] ]

xargs allows you to transfer contents of files into a command line and dynamically build command lines. (See Linux man page for a long listing of all options.)

Example A.72.

1 ls $1 | xargs -i -t mv $1/{} $2/{} 2 ls | xargs -p -l rm -rf 3 find . -type f | xargs grep -l "ellie"

Explanation

1. Moves all files from directory $1 to directory $2, and echos each mv command just before executing.

2. Prompts ( -p) the user with files that are to be removed, one at a time, and removes each one.

3. The find command starts searching the current directory for plain files, and sends the list of files to xargs. xargs transfers the filenames to grep.