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Cover image for Living in the Shell #12; mv (Move/Rename Files/Directories)
Babak K. Shandiz
Babak K. Shandiz

Posted on • Originally published at babakks.github.io on

Living in the Shell #12; mv (Move/Rename Files/Directories)

#productivity #linux #bash #devops

mv 🧳

Moves/renames files or directories.

⚠️ Default behavior is to overwrite destination files.

Rename a single file 

cd ~ && mv .bashrc .bashrc-renamed
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Move a single file into a directory 

cd ~ && mv .bashrc Documents
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Note that the Documents directory should exist.

Move a single file onto a specific new path (filename) 

cd ~ && mv .bashrc Documents/.bashrc-moved
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Move a whole directory 

mv my-src-dir ~/Documents/my-dest-dir
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⚠️ Note that if my-dest-dir already exists, my-new-src will be moved under it; i.e., you would have your files under Documents/my-dest-dir/my-src-dir

Create backup for existing destination files -b 

cd ~ && mv -b .bashrc Documents/.bashrc-moved
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Move by wildcard selection -t 

cd ~ && mv -t target-dir *.zip *.txt
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Moves all .zip and .txt files to target-dir directory.

Set to ask for overwriting -i 

cd ~ && mv -i .bashrc Documents
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Set to keep existing files (no overwrite) -n 

cd ~ && mv -n .bashrc Documents
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