As name implies find command is used to find files/directories in the Linux System.

It recursively lists all the files/directories in the provided path.

• man find to get manual of find command

• /- any_option to look for more info of specific option

Syntax:

• find [filters]

• find [path] [filters] [criteria] [actions]

path: Starting directory for search

• If no path is given, current path is consider by default.

• . for current path

• / for root path, searches in the whole system

filters: Additional conditions for search

• Many Filters can be combined as we want. The default operation performed is AND.

• Use -o so that Result is diplayed when either of the condition is met or true, useful when multiple filters applied

• -name is most used filter, it is use to search for exact filename.

• -mindepth, -maxdepth filters are used to control how deep the find recurses.

• -not to invert filters, when used that expression will be excluded or not shown

• -type [f or d] (type of file to search, f for files, d for directories)

• -size [+ or -] (Matches files based on their size, + for greater, - for lesser)

• -empty for finding empty files as a way to declutter

criteria: For filtering or locating files/directories

• * is used to search for multiple files.

actions: Perform a specified command on each and every matched file/directory.

• {} is a placeholder that represents the current file or directory.

• -delete to delete all matched files/folders

• -exec executed the specified command

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Find all files in a current path

find . -type f

Find all directories in a current path

find . -type d

Find a file/folder with Exact name

find path_to_search/ -name filename.txt

find / -name foldername

Find all empty files

find . -type f -empty

Find all the files with .jpg extension

find -name '*.jpg'

Find all the files with either .jgp OR .png extension

find -name '*.jpg' -o -name '*.png'

Find all the files/folder which are min 2 Directories deep

find path/ -mindepth 2

Find only the files/folders that are directly inside the path we provided

find . -maxdepth 1

Find all the files which are not ending with .jpg

find . -type f -not -name '*.jpg'

Find all files with size greater than 10 MB

find path/ -type f -size +10M

Find files with only size less than 10 MB

find path/ -type f -size -10M

Delete all the files with size less than 10 MB

find path/ -type f -size -7M -delete

List sha384sum of all the files

• {} represents current file/directory

• ; to tell where command ends

• \ to escape ";"

find path/ -type f -exec sha384sum {} \;

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Thanks to My Guru Tom Hudson (aka tomnomnom) for this Beautiful guide