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Guys, I'm using the find command on a Mac to search for a folder called 'test1'. Now 'test1' folder could be present in the '.Trash' folder also. How do I exclude the '.Trash' folder from getting reported in search results or basically any folder I wish to exclude?

$ find $HOME -name test1 -type d

/Users/theuser/.Trash/test1

/Users/theuser/test1

/Users/theuser/Downloads/test1

I want the result to be just

/Users/theuser/test1

/Users/theuser/Downloads/test1

I used grep:

find $HOME -name test1 -type d | grep -v '.Trash'

to filter out the .Trash result, but I'm interested in knowing if using 'find' alone achieves the same results.

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2 Answers

up vote 5 down vote accepted

find $HOME -path $HOME/.Trash -prune -o -name test1 -type d -print

Edited to add -print -- that avoids the spurious printing of .Trash.

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Use the -prune primary:

find $HOME -name .Trash -prune -o -name test1 -type d

Edit:

That will include .Trash in the output. To fix that:

find $HOME -name .Trash -prune -o \( -name test -type d -print \)
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Using -name will also excluded results in directories named .Trash which are not in the root of the user's home directory. – herrtodd May 12 '11 at 23:18
True. I went with smokingun's use of grep -v '.Trash' (should be '\.Trash') as an indication that .Trash might appear elsewhere. I think yours is the better answer, though. – garyjohn May 12 '11 at 23:25
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