Finding empty directories UNIX

bash unix directory
soField picture soField · May 11, 2010 · Viewed 64.4k times · Source

I need to find empty directories for a given list of directories. Some directories have directories inside it.

If inside directories are also empty I can say main directory is empty otherwise it's not empty.

How can I test this?

For example:

A>A1(file1),A2 this is not empty beacuse of file1
B>B1(no file) this is empty
C>C1,C2 this is empty

Answer

Martin picture Martin · May 11, 2010

It depends a little on what you want to do with the empty directories. I use the command below when I wish to delete all empty directories within a tree, say test directory. 

find test -depth -empty -delete

One thing to notice about the command above is that it will also remove empty files, so use the -type d option to avoid that.

find test -depth -type d -empty -delete

Drop -delete to see the files and directories matched.

If your definition of an empty directory tree is that it contains no files then you be able to stick something together based on whether find test -type f returns anything.

find is a great utility, and RTFM early and often to really understand how much it can do :-)

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