How to copy a file to a destination folder and cd to the destination folder in one command

Question

To explain my question, here is the dumb way of how I'm doing things:

cp fileFromMyFriend.txt ~/my_first_subfolder/my_second_subfolder/more_subfolders
cd ~/my_first_subfolder/my_second_subfolder/more_subfolders

What is a shortcut to doing those two lines in one? I'm not looking for a concatenation symbol such as & or ;

Rather I'm trying to avoid retyping my very long folder path.

(And I already looked through the cp man page and Googled this question with different wording before coming here)

if the only issue is typing the very long folder path then you can save it in a variable. — Pacifist, Sep 16 '19 at 00:13
See also How to use arguments from previous command?. I never remember to do any of this, and just retype, or use the mouse to copy-paste, or use a variable (and basename or dirname if required). — cas, Sep 16 '19 at 05:58
@steeldriver Ah I didn't realize something like that existed, thanks. I guess I was narrowing my thinking too much. — FriskySaga, Sep 16 '19 at 16:07

score 1 · Answer 1 · answered Sep 16 '19 at 06:56

If this is for interactive use: type and run the first command normally. Then type cd Space M-. (you can type M-. either as Esc . or as Alt+.). The keyboard shortcut M-. (yank-last-arg) inserts the last word of the previous command.

If this is for scripting: put the directory name in a variable. Don't forget double quotes when you use the variable.

target_dir=~/my_first_subfolder/my_second_subfolder/more_subfolders
cp fileFromMyFriend.txt "$target_dir"
cd "$target_dir"

If you find that you use the same sequence of commands a lot, define a function. The bash function below calls cp and treats the last argument as a directory to change to. If the last argument is not a directory or a symbolic link to a directory, it changes to the directory containing the last argument. This works for most ways to use cp, but not with the -t option to GNU cp.

cp_cd () {
  cp "$@"
  if [ -d "${!#}/." ]; then
    cd -- "${!#}"
  else
    cd -- "$(dirname -- "${!#}")"
  fi
}

This is pretty helpful, thanks. – FriskySaga Sep 16 '19 at 16:04 — FriskySaga, Sep 16 '19 at 16:04

score 0 · Accepted Answer · answered Sep 16 '19 at 06:23

0

I'm going to just answer this question of yours: Rather I'm trying to avoid retyping my very long folder path.

If that's what you are trying to do, you can just do this:

cp fileFromMyFriend.txt ~/my_first_subfolder/my_second_subfolder/more_subfolders
cd !$

answered Sep 16 '19 at 06:23

SparedWhisle

3,668

Marking this as the solution since this is the simplest answer for my case. I only need the last argument. I didn't know "!$" is a shortcut to using the last argument from the last command. If I had known something like that existed, I would've found this answer when searching on Google: https://unix.stackexchange.com/questions/88642/what-does-mean/88643 – FriskySaga Sep 16 '19 at 16:05

score 0 · Answer 3 · answered Sep 17 '19 at 06:38

0

In order to work with the latest file you have used, you can run the following

cd $_ # directory case
vim $_ # file case

answered Sep 17 '19 at 06:38

alessiosavi

347
2
9

How to copy a file to a destination folder and cd to the destination folder in one command

3 Answers3