I'm looking for a single linux command that allows me to do the equivalent of this:
cp /some/path/file /another/path/ && ln -sf /another/path/file /some/path/
If there isn't one, what's the best way to do this for a bunch of files?
3 Answers
A small note, is that you could use ln both times to make the command not actually move the data (assuming both paths are on the same filesystem).
ln /some/path/file /another/path/ && ln -sf /another/path/file /some/path/
But I assume that you want to move the content of /some/path/ to an other disk, and then create links to the new files so "no one" notices.
for f in `ls /some/path/`; do ln /some/path/$f /another/path/ && ln -sf /another/path/$f /some/path; done
Wrapping it in a bash function:
function cpln {
for f in `ls $1`
do
ln $1/$f $2 && ln -sf $2/$f $1
done
}
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Is there a way to make this work if what I'm moving happens to be a directory?– tladukeCommented Aug 9, 2012 at 18:50
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Ibrahim: the data doesn't move, it just updates the pointers in the directory.– Mr SharkCommented Dec 10, 2012 at 10:13
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tladuke: Yes and no. Since the directory is much smaler on disk, there is no need for the ln trick (which don't work for directorys), just do a mv :-)– Mr SharkCommented Dec 10, 2012 at 10:16
Theres my script you could use (takes two parameters /some/path/file and /another/path/ ):
#!/bin/bash
cp $1 $2
if [ "$?" -ne "0" ]; then
echo "Some error"
exit 1
fi
ln -sf $2/${1##*/} ${1%/*}
answered May 14, 2009 at 11:29
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Cool trick with the string manipulations, never saw that before. Thanks!– itsadokCommented May 17, 2009 at 11:17
Seriously, I thought this was a really easy question.
Here's what I can do in perl:
#!/bin/perl
# Usage: cpln TARGETDIR SOURCE...
# Example: find tree/ -type f | xargs cpln commands/
$target = shift;
foreach(@ARGV) {
m[(.*)/([^/]+)];
system("cp $_ $target");
system("ln -sf $target/$2 $1/");
}
I was hoping for something more elegant, but I guess I'll use that.
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2To do it "in Perl," you should use File::Copy (or similar) and symlink(). Perl is not shell; avoid system(), and especially avoid passing whole command lines to system() (e.g., what if an argument contains a space?). Either way, always, always, ALWAYS check return values. Commented May 14, 2009 at 14:53
&&with&. As written, the line does check the return value of cp and only runs the second part if it succeeded.