How do I remove all files in a directory, but not sub-folders, or their contents in linux?

Posted by Yegor on Server Fault See other posts from Server Fault or by Yegor
Published on 2010-05-25T20:54:19Z Indexed on 2010/05/25 21:03 UTC
Read the original article Hit count: 287

Filed under:

linux

|

file-removal

I have a directly called /cache which has about a million files.

I restructured my caching system to put cache files into different folders, inside the /cache dir. new cache files are already being written to those sub-folders. So I want to remove all the files inside the /cache dir that are not in any subfolder.

How would I do this in SSH?

© Server Fault or respective owner

Related posts about linux

apt-get install and update fail

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
I've got a problem with apt-get update and apt-get install ... commands . every time update or installing fails and errors are : Get:1 http://dl.google.com stable Release.gpg [198B] Ign http://dl.google.com/linux/chrome/deb/ stable/main Translation-en_US Get:2 http://dl… >>> More
kernel module compiling error

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
sh@ubuntu:/home/ccpp/helloworld$ make gcc-4.6 -O2 -DMODULE -D_KERNEL_ -W -Wall -Wstrict-prototypes -Wmissing-prototypes -isystem /lib/modules/`uname -r`/build/include -c -o hello-1.o hello-1.c hello-1.c:4:0: warning: "MODULE" redefined [enabled by default] <command-line>:0:0: note: this is… >>> More
Build-Essentials installation failing

as seen on Ask Ubuntu - Search for 'Ask Ubuntu'
I am having trouble accessing the several critical header files that show to be a part of the build process. The "Ubuntu Software Center" shows "Build Essentials" as installed: Next I did the following two commands, which did not improve the problem: ~$ sudo apt-get install build-essential [sudo]… >>> More
Updating Debian kernel

as seen on Super User - Search for 'Super User'
I'm trying to update my Debian machine to 2.6.32-46 (which is the new stable). However, after doing apt-get update my apt-cache search linux-image shows me: linux-headers-2.6.32-5-486 - Header files for Linux 2.6.32-5-486 linux-headers-2.6.32-5-686-bigmem - Header files for Linux 2.6.32-5-686-bigmem linux-headers-2… >>> More
Serial connection over a single USB cable (Windows to linux, or linux to linux)

as seen on Server Fault - Search for 'Server Fault'
I'm helping out with a project for an embedded device that only has USB and no serial. This device is running Linux. These days, when we need to connect to a serial port on a device we typically use a USB to serial adapter (on something like a phone system or a load balancing device, etc). I would… >>> More

Related posts about file-removal

Messy Filesytem : Duplicate File Removal from the command line

as seen on Super User - Search for 'Super User'
In debian/ubuntu I want to a) create a list of all the files in one directory tree b) do the same for a second directory tree c) compare the two lists such that, only the file NAMES are compared (i.e. just comparing the "file.txt" part so that "/home/folder/file.txt" == "/home/secondfolder/folder/file… >>> More
Audit file removal (auditctl)

as seen on Server Fault - Search for 'Server Fault'
For some reason, some script or program is removing a pid file for the service on the linux server (centos5.4 / 2.6.18-308.4.1.el5xen). I suspect a faulty cron script, but manual investigation did not lead me to it. And i still want to track it down. Have been using auditctl rule: auditctl -w /var/run/some_service… >>> More
How do I remove all files in a directory, but not sub-folders, or their contents in linux?

as seen on Server Fault - Search for 'Server Fault'
I have a directly called /cache which has about a million files. I restructured my caching system to put cache files into different folders, inside the /cache dir. new cache files are already being written to those sub-folders. So I want to remove all the files inside the /cache dir that are not… >>> More
Java: error handling with try-catch, empty-try-catch, dummy-return

as seen on Stack Overflow - Search for 'Stack Overflow'
A searh uses recursively defined function that easily throws exceptions. I have tried 3 ways to handle exeptions: to ignore with an empty-try-catch() add-dummy-return stop err-propagation due to exeption throw a specific except. (this part I don't really understand. If I throw except, can I force… >>> More