help with command line deletion

[Milo Velimirovic]

On Apr 19, 2007, at 7:50 AM, Ashley Aitken wrote:

> Instead of discussing the finer points of the Unix command line  
> could we conjecture how / if it could have been done the Mac way?
>
> I seem to recall the Mac way for deleting such a set of files was  
> to do a Finder find (or using Sherlock, now Spotlight) and then  
> select all and delete.
>
> Would that have been doable in this case, given the hidden nature  
> of the files, given the way Spotlight works in the Finder?

An excellent point to bring up. It is precisely because this  
incarnation of the Finder & Spotlight DO NOT give the option of truly  
showing ALL files and directories that we need to use shell commands  
and scripts to effect the removal of invisible files. Also note that  
Finder will not allow you to create a folder or rename something so  
that the new name begins with a '.' - "You cannot use a name that  
begins with a dot ".", because thses names are reserved for the  
system. Please choose another name."

I agree with the other posters about sticking to the original UNIX  
philosophy of doing one thing and doing it well (and consistently  
across versions!) Once I learned the utility of find's -print0  
combined with xargs' -0 it became a habit.

As for looking things up in man pages the Mac OS X way to do this is  
with ManOpen and its command line counterpart openman.

Regards,
Milo

> Cheers,
> Ashley.

> PS I usually can't even remember the name of the xargs command to  
> enable me to look up its man pages, and always get the find options  
> wrong at least a couple of times ...


--
Milo Velimirović                            <milov at uwlax.edu>
Unix Computer Network Administrator            608-785-6618 Office
ITS Network Services                        608-386-2817 Cell
University of Wisconsin - La Crosse
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--
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament],  
'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will  
the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the  
kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." --  
Charles Babbage