Batch Script Delete files before date on Linux

Question

I am trying to find a way to code a batch script to delete x-xxx.jpg that were created before a certain date.

How would this be done? So basically say I have 20k.jpg and I want to create a batch script on Linux to run which will delete all images created let's say before 12th December 2011.

Files created before a certain date? Or modified before a certain date? Because in general Linux filesystems do not store the creation date of a file - unlike Windows. Well, ext4 does store the creation date IIRC but the userspace has no standardized access to that timestamp... — thkala
– thkala, Commented Dec 22, 2012 at 9:47

Jirilmon · Accepted Answer · 2012-12-22 09:29:18Z

4

Instead of depending on a date, why cant we delete file those are 'N' days old?

For example here is the 'find' command to 'print' *.jpg files those were created before 2 days.

find /folder_path/ -iname '*.jpg' -type f -ctime  +1 -print

Note: replace the '-print' option with '-delete' if you want to delete files returned from the search result.

Here is an excellent tutorial for 'find' command

answered Dec 22, 2012 at 9:29

Jirilmon

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2 Comments

soniccool Over a year ago

This is awesome. Better than using a file straight from putty thanks!

thkala Over a year ago

+1 for correctly addressing the actual problem.

choroba · Accepted Answer · 2012-12-22 13:07:14Z

1

The following script uses the -ot test ("older to"):

#/bin/bash
touch -d "$1" /tmp/D
shift
for file in "$@" ; do
    [[ $file -ot /tmp/D ]] && rm "$file"
done
rm /tmp/D

Save it as delete-older.sh, make it executable chmod u+x delete-older.sh, run it as

path/to/script/delete-older.sh 2011/12/12 *.jpg

edited Dec 22, 2012 at 13:07

answered Dec 22, 2012 at 7:54

choroba

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Comments

Dave Clemmer · Accepted Answer · 2012-12-22 17:31:20Z

1

find . -name "*.jpg" -mtime +1 -ok rm {} \;

edited Dec 22, 2012 at 17:31

Dave Clemmer

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answered Dec 22, 2012 at 17:13

knesenko

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perreal · Accepted Answer · 2012-12-22 08:17:10Z

0

To delete jpg file older than, for example, 20 days:

find . -mtime +1 -name '*.jpg'

answered Dec 22, 2012 at 8:17

perreal

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Siwei · Accepted Answer · 2013-02-07 03:31:19Z

0

on centos 4.4, you have to use single quote for {},e.g.

# delete the "log/*.log" files that are 7 days ago. 
find log/*.log -mtime +7 -exec rm '{}' \;

answered Feb 7, 2013 at 3:31

Siwei

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