rename hundreds of file by removing last few characters

Question

I have hundreds of file andI want to remove last 7 characters from the filename but keeping its extension.

Old name:

abc_xyz12_4567.txt

abcde_xyz12_4567.txt

New name:

abc_xyz.txt

abcde_xyz.txt

Answer 1

try

ls | awk -F. '{printf "mv %s %s.%s\n",$0,substr($1,1,length($1)-7),$2 ;}' | ksh

you can use

ls | awk -F. '{printf "mv %s %s.%s\n",$0,substr($1,1,length($1)-7),$2 ;}'

to have a preview.

Answer 2

You can use rename (Or prename in some OS):

rename 's/.{7}(\.txt)/$1/' abc*

Answer 3

with GNU tar:

touch abc_xyz12_4567.txt abcde_xyz12_4567.txt
tar --remove-files --xform='s/\(.*\).\{7\}\./\1./' -c ./* | tar -x
ls

OUTPUT

abcde_xyz.txt  abc_xyz.txt

That will do it all safely - and in fact you don't even need the --remove-files option - you might instead untar the files to a different directory and verify the filename change worked. Maybe like:

tar --xform... | tar -C ../test -x