How to move all the files with specific prefix of the directory?

Question

I have a following directory structure (assume no two files have the same name):

Apple1
- apple1.jpg
- apple2.jpg
Apple2
- apple3.jpg
- apple4.jpg
Apple3
Tomato
Peach

And i would like to move one directory to the top directory all the *.jpg files inside the directories, which names start from Apple.

As a result I expect the Apple directories to be empty and the images from Apple directories to be in the top.

I have tried doing like mv "Apple*/*.jpg" ., or find . "Apple*/*.jpg" -exec mv -t . {} + as prescribed here How to integrate mv command after find command?. But this doesn't work.

When executing mv i receive a following message:

mv: cannot stat ‘Apple*/*.jpg’: No such file or directory

Seems like it has not found anything matching the pattern. And other option simply outputs nothing. Maybe the reason is, that in the case of subdirectories regular expression needs to be modified?

I would be very grateful for help and suggestions.

A picture is worth ~ 1k words, so post a tree diagram of what you want the post-move dir structure to look like. — guest_7, Mar 20 '21 at 10:27
@guest_7 I would like to simply move all the images to the root directory as I've mentioned — spiridon_the_sun_rotator, Mar 20 '21 at 10:29
What is the error you get when you run the move command mv Apple*/*.jpg .? — guest_7, Mar 20 '21 at 10:32
What do you mean that it doesn't work? What you currently doesn't show enough regarding what you want to do. — Nasir Riley, Mar 20 '21 at 10:32
@NasirRiley I would like to move all the files, which end on *.jpg from directories, which start on Apple to the topl level of the hierarchy. My current solution is most probably a nonsense - and I am asking how to achieve the needed fuctionality. — spiridon_the_sun_rotator, Mar 20 '21 at 10:34
More information is needed. What exactly isn't working? Are there are any error messages? If so, what commands are causing them? Add this to your question and not in the comments. — Nasir Riley, Mar 20 '21 at 10:38
You need to remove those quotes from the move command for the globbing to happen. — guest_7, Mar 20 '21 at 10:41
@Quasímodo in my particular case - this situation is not the case. However, in general, it is really worth considering this situation — spiridon_the_sun_rotator, Mar 20 '21 at 11:59

How to move all the files with specific prefix of the directory?

0 Answers0