Xargs command

xargs is a great command that can help us to run commands from the output of another command. From tldr xargs: Execute a command with piped arguments coming from another command, a file, etc. The input is treated as a single block of text and split into separate pieces on spaces, tabs, newlines and end-of-file. For the examples we’re going to use the seq command: # Print 3 numbers seq 3 # 1 # 2 # 3 # xorgs wil print the numbers "inline" seq 3 | xargs # 1 2 3 # -n will use a max number of arguments per command line seq 3 | xargs -n 2 # 1 2 # 3 # -I is used to replace {} with the argument from the previous command seq 3 | xargs -I {} echo 'number {} printed' # number 1 printed # number 2 printed # number 3 printed # Create 1, 2, 3 folders seq 3 | xargs mkdir # Remove 1, 2, 3 folders seq 3 | xargs rm -rf

July 3, 2024 · 1 min · Elvin Guti