Question

Quick question : I want to delete all but 1 file and 1 directory from the directory I am currently in. How do I do this?

The case scenario :

I have a directory which has three directories a b c and three files 1.php 2.php 3.php. I want to remove directories a,b and files 1.php and 2.php ONLY! I am having a hard time trying to do this.

The solution should scale up, i.e. I don’t want to have to list all the files I do want to delete, only the ones that should stay.

What do I do?

Answer 1

in bash

shopt -s extglob
echo rm -r !(3.php|c)

Demo

$ mkdir -p x/a x/b x/c
$ cd x
$ touch {1,2,3}.php
$ ls -F
1.php  2.php  3.php  a/  b/  c/
$ shopt -s extglob
$ echo rm -r !(3.php|c)
rm -r 1.php 2.php a b

See pattern matching in the bash manual.