Understand and use command-line wildcards (*, ?, [ ]) for file and directory manipulation.

Context: GNU/Linux example commands.

 Understand and use command-line wildcards (*, ?, [ ]) for file and directory manipulation.

Certainly! Here are examples of GNU/Linux commands that demonstrate the use of command-line wildcards for file and directory manipulation:

1. Using Asterisk (*) Wildcard:

   • List all files with a specific extension in the current directory:

     ls *.txt

     This command lists all files in the current directory ending with the ".txt" extension.

   • Copy all files from a directory to another directory:

     cp /path/to/source/* /path/to/destination/

     This command copies all files (excluding directories) from the source directory to the destination directory.

2. Using Question Mark (?) Wildcard:

   • List files with a single character filename extension:

     ls ?.txt

     This command lists all files in the current directory with a single character filename extension ending with ".txt".

   • Remove files with a specific pattern in the filename:

     rm file-?.txt

     This command removes files with a filename like "file-?.txt", where "?" represents any single character.

3. Using Bracket ([ ]) Wildcard:

   • List files with specific characters in the filename:

     ls [abc]*.txt

     This command lists files in the current directory starting with "a", "b", or "c" and ending with ".txt".

   • Copy or move files matching a range of characters in the filename:

     cp [a-d]*.txt /path/to/destination/ mv [a-d]*.txt /path/to/destination/

     These commands copy or move files starting with "a", "b", "c", or "d" and ending with ".txt" to the destination directory.

These examples illustrate the usage of wildcards (*, ?, [ ]) for file and directory manipulation in GNU/Linux. Wildcards provide a powerful and flexible way to specify patterns when working with files and directories on the command line.