This repository contains the mvgp (group file renaming) command and support files.
This is the distribution of mvgp and cpgp, version 1.2, February 2000. This README.md file was updated in June of 2019.
In this README file, a dollar sign ($) followed by a space is used to signify the bash (or other Bourne-like shell) prompt.
mvgp renames or copies groups of files. As a quick example, suppose you have the following files from your digital camera in a directory:
IMG-20180323-45261.JPG
IMG-20180323-45262.JPG
IMG-20180323-45263.JPG
IMG-20180323-45264.JPG
IMG-20180323-45265.JPG
and you want more descriptive file names. The following command
$ mvgp IMG-20180323-452 BellRock-24March2018- *.JPG
will rename the files to
BellRock-24March2018-61.JPG
BellRock-24March2018-62.JPG
BellRock-24March2018-63.JPG
BellRock-24March2018-64.JPG
BellRock-24March2018-65.JPG
and then the command
$ mvgp JPG jpg *.JPG
Changes the uppercase JPG extension to lowercase.
The first argument is what to change, the second is what to change it to, and the rest of the arguments are the names of files to rename or copy.
The first argument may use Bash's pattern matching operators to match a pattern, rather than a literal string. And of course, the list of files to rename or copy may be specified by the shell's file globbing operators (*, ?, and []).
Append .txt to the names of all files in the directory:
$ ls
abc def ghi jkl
$ mvgp '%' .txt *
$ ls
abc.txt def.txt ghi.txt jkl.txt
Prepend filename. to the names of all files starting with a or d:
$ ls
abc def ghi jkl
$ mvgp '#' filename. [ad]*
$ ls
filename.abc filename.def ghi jkl
Change every occurence of a to o in files starting with a d:
$ ls
aaa abc abe backup bad cab cabe dab dala fab
$ mvgp -m a o d*
$ ls
aaa abc abe backup bad cab cabe dob dolo fab
Change the three-character string of composed of any character, followed by an a, followed by any character, to aoe in the names of all files in the current working directory:
$ ls
aaa abc abe backup bad cab cabe dob dolo fab
$ mvgp '?a?' aoe *
$ ls
abc abe aoe aoee aoekup dob dolo
Notice that this renamed three files to aoe, and as a result, two files were lost. Be careful; mvgp is a powerful command. If in doubt, use the -C (noclobber), -I (interactive), -n ("nop", or no operation) options to keep mvgp from performing unwanted actions.
To install mvgp and cpgp, edit the Makefile to set BINDIR to the directory where you want mvgp and cpgp to be located, then run the command
$ sudo make install
(sudo is necessary only if you are copying to a system directory, or any other that your regular account does not have permission to write to.)
To install the manual page for mvgp, edit Makefile to set MANDIR to the directory where you want mvgp manual page to be located, then run this command:
$ sudo make install-man
Run the command man mvgp to read the manual page, or mvgp -h to read a manpage-like help document.
A copy of the manual page is included here for convenience. To display it better, install it on your system and use a man mvgp command to view it.
MVGP(1) User Commands MVGP(1)
NAME
mvgp - mvgp, cpgp
NAME
mvgp - rename a group of files
cpgp - make copies of a group of files
SYNOPSIS
mvgp [-opts] pattern replacement files
cpgp [-opts] pattern replacement files
DESCRIPTION
mvgp(1) and cpgp(1) operate on a group of files, changing their names
using a search-and-replace method specified by the first two non-option
arguments (called pattern and replacement above).
mvgp renames files, identically to the mv(1) command, and cpgp copies
files in a manner identical to the cp(1) command.
pattern is the substring that exists in the files´ names, that is to be
replaced with replacement. pattern and replacement may contain slash
characters that will be interpreted as directory path specifiers.
SPECIFYING PATTERNS
pattern is treated as a pattern that can match parts of file names in
the argument list using the *, ? and [] metacharacters. This matching
happens after the shell has created a list of filenames, which may also
involve expanding metacharacters.
If the pattern begins with a #, it must match at the beginning of the
file name. If the pattern begins with a %, it must match at the end of
the file name. See the section on "Parameter Expansion" in the bash(1)
manual page for details.
OPTIONS
-b, -f, -i, -S suffix, -u, -V word (mvgp or cpgp)
-a, -d, -l, -p, -P, -r, -R, -s, -x (cpgp only)
These are passed directly through to the mv or cp command,
which does the actual renaming or copying of files. See
mv(1) and cp(1) for documentation on these.
-C Noclobber. Don´t replace files that already exist.
-h Show this help message.
-I Interactive - ask for permission before renaming or copying.
The the operation that is about to be performed is printed,
followed by a ´?´. Valid responses are:
y, Y, Yes, yes, YES: Go ahead and rename or copy
the file.
n, N, No, no, NO: Skip the file.
a, A, All, all, ALL: Perform this renaming or copying,
and all others that follow (exit -I mode).
q, Q, Quit, quit, QUIT: Don´t rename or copy this file
or any others that follow. (Exit the program.)
All other responses are treated as a ´no´. The response
must be followed by a press of the Enter (Return) key.
-L (Loud) Report what mv or cp operations are performed, using
the exact syntax of the mv or cp command that was executed.
-m Perform multiple substitutions. If pattern exists more
than once in the original file name, it will be replaced
for each occurrence. Without the -m option, only the first
occurrence will be replaced.
-n Don´t rename or copy files; just tell what would be done.
(Show the exact mv or cp commands that would execute.)
-v Report release version of mvgp/cpgp and the mv or cp command.
Don´t do anything else.
EXAMPLES
Example 1: Inserting
$ cpgp txt bak.txt book*
Make backup files of all files whose names start with "book". The sub‐
string "txt" in the files´ names is replaced with "bak.txt". For exam‐
ple, if there were files called
book-chapter-1.txt
book-chapter-2.txt
book-chapter-3.txt
copies of those files would be made with the names
book-chapter-1.bak.txt
book-chapter-2.bak.txt
book-chapter-3.bak.txt
Example 2: Replacing
$ mvgp new old *new*
For each file in the current directory that has the string "new" any‐
where in its name, replace the first occurrence of "new" with "old".
Files called ...
the-new-version.c
new-version-header.h
my-new-version.readme
a_new_newt
newspaper.doc
... would be renamed as ...
the-old-version.c
old-version-header.h
my-old-version.readme
a_old_newt
oldspaper.doc
Example 3: De-spacing file names
$ mvgp -m -L ´ ´ - *
Replace all of the spaces in filenames of files in the current direc‐
tory with dash (minus) characters. Report each rename operation that
happens.
Example 4: Deleting
$ mvgp ´-´ ´´ -*
For files in the current directory whose names start with a ´-´ charac‐
ter, remove that leading ´-´ from the name (i.e., replace the ´-´ with
nothing). Note that in this case, it is not necessary to give mvgp a
´--´ option to keep it from treating ´-´ as an option. However, if the
pattern were ´-m´ or something else that looks like a valid option,
then the command would be
$ mvgp -- ´-m´ ´m´ -*
(which would do the same thing as the first command).
Example 5: Changing the extensions, or end of files´ names
$ mvgp ´%.old´ .bak *.old
For all files in the current directory that end in ".old", the exten‐
sion will be changed to ".bak".
Example 6: Changing the beginning of the names
$ mvgp ´#re´ un re*
All files in the current directory whose names start with "re" will
have "re" changed to "un" in their names. (I.e., files named "redo.1"
and "redo.2" will be renamed "undo.1" and "undo.2", respectively.)
Example 7: Pattern matching in the pattern
Suppose we have files named
written-by-Stan
painted-by-Jane
sculpted-by-Bob
built-by-Andrew
and we want to change them to all start out with "created-by". One way
to do that would be
$ mvgp ´*-by´ created-by *-by-*
If we only wanted to operate on the first three, we could say
$ mvgp ´*e?-by´ created-by *-by-*
or
$ mvgp ´*-by´ created-by *e?-by-*
Example 8: Directories in search-and-replace strings
$ mvgp ´projects/´ ´backburner/source-´ projects/code/*
move all of the files and directories in the subdirectory
"projects/code" to the directory "backburner/source-code".
IMPLEMENTATION
mvgp and cpgp are implemented as a single bash shell script. Both com‐
mands are actually the same program; the function is determined by the
name of the executable file. cpgp is simply a symbolic link to the mvgp
script.
BUGS
None known. If you find a bug, please report it to the author.
SEE ALSO
cp(1), mv(1), bash(1)
COPYRIGHT
Copyright 2000 Jay Ts. mvgp and cpgp are released under the GPL (GNU
Public License). You may find a copy of the GPL at http://www.fsf.org.
AUTHOR
Jay Ts (http://jayts.com)
Jay Ts June 2019 MVGP(1)