renaming files...

base_16 has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

I wrote the following code to go through a directory of files and rename them.
The files are of the format:
A-1024-01-AM
I want to take the `-AM' off of the file.
Why doesn't this code work?
Any help would be appreciated.

$DIR=".";
opendir CONCEPT, $DIR || die "no such dir";
while ($TEMP = readdir(CONCEPT))
{
    $TEMP1 = $TEMP;
    if ($TEMP1 =~ /(A-[0-9]+-[0-9]+)/) { 
        if (rename $TEMP, $TEMP1)
             { print $TEMP1; }
        }
}
[download]

Comment on renaming files... Download Code

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: renaming files... by lhoward (Vicar) on Aug 08, 2000 at 22:04 UTC
...because in your inner loop $TEMP and $TEMP1 have the same value. You may want to try it like this: `#!/usr/bin/perl -w use strict; my $dir="."; opendir CONCEPT, $dir \|\| die "no such dir"; while (my $temp = readdir(CONCEPT)){ if ($temp =~ /^(A-\d+-\d+)/) { rename $temp, $1 or die "error $! renaming $temp to $1"; } } closedir CONCEPT;` [download]	[reply] [d/l]
Re: renaming files... by plaid (Chaplain) on Aug 08, 2000 at 22:06 UTC
On the line `if ($TEMP1 =~ /(A-[0-9]+-[0-9]+)/) {` [download] You want to take the output of the pattern match. $TEMP1 isn't being altered at all, it's just being matched against. The result of the pattern match is left in $1. Try this: `$DIR="."; opendir CONCEPT, $DIR \|\| die "no such dir"; while ($TEMP = readdir(CONCEPT)) { if ($TEMP =~ /(A-[0-9]+-[0-9]+)/) { if (rename $TEMP, $1) { print $1; } } }` [download] The code was editted as little as possible. Any stricting, -w'ing, and error checking is left as an excercise to the reader.	[reply] [d/l] [select]
RE: renaming files... by steveAZ98 (Monk) on Aug 09, 2000 at 00:59 UTC
I'm not sure that you can use this but instead of writing your own script you could use rename like follows. `rename 's/-AM$//' *` [download] In the directory that you need to rename the files. I believe rename is part of perl. HTH	[reply] [d/l]
Re: renaming files... by ar0n (Priest) on Aug 08, 2000 at 22:01 UTC
wrong advice, don't listen to me. nothing to see here, move along folks. You need to escape the '-' character, because it's interpreted as a range. update: that was a little short, try this: `$TEMP1 =~ /^(A\-[0-9]+\-[0-9]+)\-AM/` notice the '\' characters. And the '^' so it'll only match files beginning with "A-123-123-AM" update numero deux: woops, guess i was wrong. need to get handle on rexeps, sorry. (and actually read posts) -- ar0n \| Just Another Perl Joe	[reply] [d/l]
RE: Re: renaming files... by tye (Sage) on Aug 08, 2000 at 22:10 UTC
Actually, you don't need to quote the '-'s, they aren't making a range. See other follow-ups for why the code isn't working. - tye (but my friends call me "Tye")	[reply]


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