Practical examples of Linux Find command

The find command in Linux is a powerful utility used to search for files and directories in a given directory hierarchy. It is a command-line tool that offers many options to filter and refine the search results.

Here's a step-by-step guide on how to use the find command with examples for various switches:

1. Basic usage

The basic usage of the find command is as follows:

find /path/to/search -name "filename"

This command searches for files with the given name in the specified path.

Example: To find all files named example.txt in the current directory and its subdirectories, use the following command:

find . -name "example.txt"

2. Search by file type

You can use the -type option to search for files of a specific type.

Example: To find all directories in the current directory and its subdirectories, use the following command:

find . -type d

To find all files in the current directory and its subdirectories, use the following command:

find . -type f

3. Search by file size

You can use the -size option to search for files of a specific size. The size can be specified in bytes, kilobytes, megabytes, or gigabytes.

Example: To find all files in the current directory and its subdirectories that are larger than 1 MB, use the following command:

find . -size +1M

4. Search by modification time

You can use the -mtime option to search for files based on their modification time. The time can be specified in days.

Example: To find all files in the current directory and its subdirectories that have been modified within the last 7 days, use the following command:

find . -mtime -7

5. Search by user or group

You can use the -user and -group options to search for files owned by a specific user or group.

Example: To find all files in the current directory and its subdirectories that are owned by the user john, use the following command:

find . -user john

To find all files in the current directory and its subdirectories that are owned by the group developers, use the following command:

find . -group developers

6. Search by permissions:

You can use the -perm option to search for files based on their permissions.

Example: To find all files in the current directory and its subdirectories that have read and write permissions for the owner and read permissions for others, use the following command:

find . -perm 644

7. Search by name with wildcard:

You can use the * and ? characters as wildcards to search for files with a pattern in their name.

Example: To find all files in the current directory and its subdirectories that have the word example in their name, use the following command:

find . -name "*example*"

8. Search by exclusion:

You can use the ! character to exclude files or directories from the search results.

Example: To find all files in the current directory and its subdirectories that are not named example.txt, use the following command:

find . ! -name "example.txt"

These are just a few examples of the many options available with the find command in Linux. By combining these options, you can perform complex searches to locate the files or directories you need.