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i need to copy all txt files included in a lot of subdirectories into a single directory. Example: 

 MyDir
   Dir1
     1.txt
     2.txt
   Dir2
     a.txt
     b.txt
     e.jpg
   Dir3 
     f.txt
     k.txt
  MyDestination

How to copy all txt to MyDestination ?

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2 Answers

up vote 6 down vote accepted

Try using find ... 

find /MyDir -name '*.txt' -exec cp -t /MyDestination "{}" +

which will find the relevant txt files and pass them in batches to cp to have it copy them to MyDestination.

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up vote 0 down vote

What about

cp -R *.txt <destination>

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3  
This won't work because the *.txt is expanded by the shell, not by cp. This will copy any top level .txt files as well as recursively copy any top level directories which match *.txt. – mgorven May 12 '12 at 18:43
Ah ok, thanks for clearing that up! :) – Dean Perry May 12 '12 at 18:58

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