Process files in loop which have spaces in name

Shell Programming and Scripting
1

I have a folder with files and I have to process them in a loop. However the filenames have space characters, so the list get split.

$ touch "File Number_1"
$ touch "File Number_2"
$ ls "/tmp/File Number"_*
/tmp/File Number_1  /tmp/File Number_2

I tried following (sorry for using the `tcsh`):

$ foreach file ( `ls "/tmp/File Number"_*` )
foreach? echo ">"$file"<"
foreach? end
>/tmp/File<
>Number_1<
>/tmp/File<
>Number_2<


$ set FILES = ( `ls "/tmp/File Number"_*` )
$ while ( $#FILES )
while? echo ">"$FILES[1]"<"
while? shift FILES
while? end
>/tmp/File<
>Number_1<
>/tmp/File<
>Number_2<

set FILES = "/tmp/File Number"_*
... same as above

Can you help me to solve my problem?

btw, I don't mind to get a solution which renames the files. The files will be renamed anyway.

Best Regards
Wernfried

2

Hello Wernfried,

Could you please try following and let me know if this helps(I haven't tested though.).

for file in $(find -type f -iname "File Number_*")
do
      do echo $file
done

Thanks,
R. Singh

3

Same result:

./File
Number_2
./File
Number_1

Best Regards

---------- Post updated at 11:25 ---------- Previous update was at 10:40 ----------

I found a working solution:

for f in /tmp/File\ Number_*; do mv "$f" "${f// /}"; done

Best Regards

4

Yes, quoting is the solution. Examples with " "

/tmp/File" "Number_*
"/tmp/File Number_"*
/tmp/"File Number_"*