Argument list too long error for rm, cp, mv commands

Question

I have several hundred PDFs under a directory in UNIX. The names of the PDFs are really long (approx. 60 chars). When I try to delete all PDFs together using the following command: ``` rm -f *.pdf ``` I get the following error: ``` /bin/rm: cannot execute [Argument list too long] ``` What is the solution to this error? Does this error occur for `mv` and `cp` commands as well? If yes, how to solve for these commands?

Accepted Answer

The reason this occurs is because bash actually expands the asterisk to every matching file, producing a very long command line.

Try this:

```
find . -name "*.pdf" -print0 | xargs -0 rm
```

Warning: this is a recursive search and will find (and delete) files in subdirectories as well. Tack on `-f` to the rm command only if you are sure you don't want confirmation.

You can do the following to make the command non-recursive:

```
find . -maxdepth 1 -name "*.pdf" -print0 | xargs -0 rm
```

Another option is to use find's `-delete` flag:

```
find . -name "*.pdf" -delete
```

Argument list too long error for rm, cp, mv commands

Solution

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