Practical UNIX

Using Filename Generation Wildcards

Most of the file commands can work with one or more files. For example, file commands can work with the following:

• Single files

• Several files

• Hundreds of files

• Tens of thousands of files (This is, of course, more difficult.)

As always, UNIX can increase productivity. In this case, UNIX provides a way to enter a very long series of filenames to a command by using a very short sequence of keystrokes. The user can enter within any command one or more pattern words, and the shell will replace each pattern with a list of all filenames that match that pattern. A pattern word is any word that contains one of the wildcard characters shown in Table 11.1. Each of these wildcards will be covered in the following sections. ...