1RENAME(1)                        User Commands                       RENAME(1)
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NAME

6       rename - rename files
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SYNOPSIS

9       rename [options] expression replacement file...
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DESCRIPTION

12       rename  will  rename  the specified files by replacing the first occur‐
13       rence of expression in their name by replacement.
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OPTIONS

16       -s, --symlink
17              Do not rename a symlink but its target.
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19       -v, --verbose
20              Show which files were renamed, if any.
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22       -n, --no-act
23              Do not make any changes; add --verbose  to  see  what  would  be
24              made.
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26       -o, --no-overwrite
27              Do  not  overwrite existing files.  When --symlink is active, do
28              not overwrite symlinks pointing to existing targets.
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30       -i, --interactive
31              Ask before overwriting existing files.
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33       -V, --version
34              Display version information and exit.
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36       -h, --help
37              Display help text and exit.
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WARNING

40       The renaming has no safeguards by default or without  any  one  of  the
41       options  --no-overwrite,  --interactive  or  --no-act.  If the user has
42       permission to rewrite file names, the command will perform  the  action
43       without  any  questions.   For example, the result can be quite drastic
44       when the command is run as root in the /lib directory.  Always  make  a
45       backup  before  running the command, unless you truly know what you are
46       doing.
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INTERACTIVE MODE

49       As most standard utilities rename can be used with  a  terminal  device
50       (tty in short) in canonical mode, where the line is buffered by the tty
51       and you press ENTER to validate the user input.  If you put your tty in
52       cbreak  mode however, rename requires only a single key press to answer
53       the prompt.  To set cbreak mode, run for example:
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55              sh -c 'stty -icanon min 1; "$0" "$@"; stty icanon' rename -i from to files
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EXIT STATUS

58              0      all requested rename operations were successful
59              1      all rename operations failed
60              2      some rename operations failed
61              4      nothing was renamed
62              64     unanticipated error occurred
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EXAMPLES

65       Given the files foo1, ..., foo9, foo10, ..., foo278, the commands
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67              rename foo foo00 foo?
68              rename foo foo0 foo??
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70       will turn them into foo001, ..., foo009, foo010, ..., foo278.  And
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72              rename .htm .html *.htm
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74       will fix the extension of your html files.  Provide an empty string for
75       shortening:
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77              rename '_with_long_name' '' file_with_long_name.*
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79       will remove the substring in the filenames.
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SEE ALSO

82       mv(1)
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AVAILABILITY

85       The  rename  command is part of the util-linux package and is available
86       from https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/.
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90util-linux                         June 2011                         RENAME(1)
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