Is there a command that will simply give me a count of files in a given
directory? ls lists them and du gives me size of directory. I just want a
count.

Its for a perl script I am working on.

M

On Mon, 12 Nov 2007 14:12:31 -0600, M wrote:
> Is there a command that will simply give me a count of files in a given
> directory? ls lists them and du gives me size of directory. I just want a
> count.

ls | wc -l


> Its for a perl script I am working on.

Sorry do not know how to do it in Perl language.

On 2007-11-12, M wrote:
>
> Is there a command that will simply give me a count of files in a given
> directory? ls lists them and du gives me size of directory. I just want a
> count.

set -- *
count=$#

> Its for a perl script I am working on.

This sort of thing is much easier in a shell script.

--
Chris F.A. Johnson, author | <http://cfaj.freeshell.org>
Shell Scripting Recipes: | My code in this post, if any,
A Problem-Solution Approach | is released under the
2005, Apress | GNU General Public Licence

On Mon, 12 Nov 2007 20:17:09 +0000, Bit Twister wrote:

> On Mon, 12 Nov 2007 14:12:31 -0600, M wrote:
>> Is there a command that will simply give me a count of files in a given
>> directory? ls lists them and du gives me size of directory. I just
>> want a count.
>
> ls | wc -l
>
>
>> Its for a perl script I am working on.
>
> Sorry do not know how to do it in Perl language.

Be nice now, aliases of "ls" can botch *that*...

/bin/ls -1 | wc -l

On Mon, 12 Nov 2007 17:10:37 -0600, Thomas P Brisco wrote:

> On Mon, 12 Nov 2007 20:17:09 +0000, Bit Twister wrote:
>
>> On Mon, 12 Nov 2007 14:12:31 -0600, M wrote:
>>> Is there a command that will simply give me a count of files in a given
>>> directory? ls lists them and du gives me size of directory. I just
>>> want a count.
>>
>> ls | wc -l
>>
>>
>>> Its for a perl script I am working on.
>>
>> Sorry do not know how to do it in Perl language.
>
> Be nice now, aliases of "ls" can botch *that*...
>
> /bin/ls -1 | wc -l

Small correction: that should have been

/bin/ls | wc -l

because "/bin/ls -l" is off by one, due to the "total" line it throws at
the top of the list.

On 2007-11-12, Chris F.A. Johnson <cfajohnson******.com> wrote:
> On 2007-11-12, M wrote:
>>
>> Is there a command that will simply give me a count of files in a given
>> directory? ls lists them and du gives me size of directory. I just want a
>> count.
>
> set -- *
> count=$#

I almost forget to do "echo $count" and thought I had nothing.

;-)

Mark South wrote:

....
>>>ls | wc -l
>>>
>>>>Its for a perl script I am working on.
>>>>
>>>Sorry do not know how to do it in Perl language.
>>>
>>Be nice now, aliases of "ls" can botch *that*...
>>
>>/bin/ls -1 | wc -l
>
> Small correction: that should have been
>
> /bin/ls | wc -l
>
> because "/bin/ls -l" is off by one, due to the "total" line it throws at
> the top of the list.

/bin/ls -1 (as in /bin/ls -<the_numer_one>) forces single column output (the
default for to a non-tty) is what was suggested, not /bin/ls -l (as in
/bin/ls -<letter_ell>) as that lists the files *and* gives a total count.
(There is a slight difference on my screen, but it is very hard to spot.)

On Tue, 13 Nov 2007 16:44:03 +0000, Robert Newson wrote:

> Mark South wrote:
>
> ...
>>>>ls | wc -l
>>>>
>>>>>Its for a perl script I am working on.
>>>>>
>>>>Sorry do not know how to do it in Perl language.
>>>>
>>>Be nice now, aliases of "ls" can botch *that*...
>>>
>>>/bin/ls -1 | wc -l
>>
>> Small correction: that should have been
>>
>> /bin/ls | wc -l
>>
>> because "/bin/ls -l" is off by one, due to the "total" line it throws at
>> the top of the list.
>
> /bin/ls -1 (as in /bin/ls -<the_numer_one>) forces single column output (the
> default for to a non-tty) is what was suggested, not /bin/ls -l (as in
> /bin/ls -<letter_ell>) as that lists the files *and* gives a total count.
> (There is a slight difference on my screen, but it is very hard to spot.)

My apologies, in my font they are more or less indistinguishable :-)

It should, as you point out, be unnecessary, because ls should write each
element of its output on a new line when piped.

Anyway, I need glasses or better fonts. Or maybe I have an excuse to buy
a new monitor? Yeah! That must be the solution ;-)

M wrote:
> Is there a command that will simply give me a count of files in a given
> directory? ls lists them and du gives me size of directory. I just want a
> count.
>
> Its for a perl script I am working on.
>
> M
>
>

#! /usr/bin/perl -w
use File::Find ();
my $Count=0;
sub wanted {(my @stat = lstat($_)) && -f _ && $Count++;}


File::Find::find({wanted => \&wanted}, '.');
print "$Count\n";
exit;



Doug

On 12 nov, 17:12, "M" <n...@spam.tonsjunkmail.com> wrote:
> Is there a command that will simply give me a count of files in a given
> directory? ls lists them and du gives me size of directory. I just want a
> count.
>
> Its for a perl script I am working on.
>
> M


Try:

/bin/ls | wc -m
Check, in wc help, the correct argument for words.

"M" <no@spam.tonsjunkmail.com> wrote:

> Is there a command that will simply give me a count of files in a given
> directory? ls lists them and du gives me size of directory. I just want a
> count.
>
> Its for a perl script I am working on.

$dir='/tmp/*';
print scalar map {$_} <${dir}>, "\n"


Florian
--
<http://www.florian-diesch.de/>
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
** Hi! I'm a signature virus! Copy me into your signature, please! **
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Mark South wrote:

....
>>/bin/ls -1 (as in /bin/ls -<the_numer_one>) forces single column output (the
>>default for to a non-tty) is what was suggested, not /bin/ls -l (as in
>>/bin/ls -<letter_ell>) as that lists the files *and* gives a total count.
>>(There is a slight difference on my screen, but it is very hard to spot.)
>
> My apologies, in my font they are more or less indistinguishable :-)
>
> It should, as you point out, be unnecessary, because ls should write each
> element of its output on a new line when piped.

But it *IS* useful to know just in cases ls is aliased to include things
like -C (the last of -C and -1 (minus one) takes precedence).

> Anyway, I need glasses or better fonts. Or maybe I have an excuse to buy
> a new monitor? Yeah! That must be the solution ;-)
^_^

eu.alug******.com wrote:

....
> Try:
>
> /bin/ls | wc -m
> Check, in wc help, the correct argument for words.

Hmmm...
$ man ls
....
-w, --words
print the word counts

So I presume you mean -w. Ok let's try it:
$ cd /win/c
$ ls -F
Config.sys* autoexec.bat* inspect.txt* os832217.bin* system.1st*
DDCheck.txt* autoexec.dos* io.sys* recycled/ timer/
Matrox/ command.com* kpcms/ scandisk.log* tmp/
My Documents/ config.dos* msdos.sys* setupxlg.txt* utils/
Program Files/ detlog.txt* nc/ suhdlog.---* windows/
Wanadoo/ dist.txt* netlog.txt* suhdlog.dat*
$ ls | wc -l
29
$ ls -1 | wc -l
29
$ ls -l | wc -l
30
$ ls | wc -w
31

[The 2nd line is "ls minus one pipe...", the 3rd is "ls minus ell pipe..."]

Oops...the directory "Program Files" is 2 [space separated] words, as is the
directory "My Documents".

On Tue, 13 Nov 2007 10:52:15 -0800, eu.alug******.com wrote:
> On 12 nov, 17:12, "M" <n...@spam.tonsjunkmail.com> wrote:
>> Is there a command that will simply give me a count of files in a given
>> directory? ls lists them and du gives me size of directory. I just want a
>> count.
>>
>> Its for a perl script I am working on.
>
> Try:
>
> /bin/ls | wc -m
> Check, in wc help, the correct argument for words.

ITYM: ls | wc -l

Jonesy
--
Marvin L Jones | jonz | W3DHJ | linux
38.24N 104.55W | @ config.com | Jonesy | OS/2
*** Killfiling google posts: <http://jonz.net/ng.htm>

Allodoxaphobia wrote:
> On Tue, 13 Nov 2007 10:52:15 -0800, eu.alug******.com wrote:
>> On 12 nov, 17:12, "M" <n...@spam.tonsjunkmail.com> wrote:
>>> Is there a command that will simply give me a count of files in a given
>>> directory? ls lists them and du gives me size of directory. I just want a
>>> count.
>>>
>>> Its for a perl script I am working on.
>> Try:
>>
>> /bin/ls | wc -m
>> Check, in wc help, the correct argument for words.
>
> ITYM: ls | wc -l
>
> Jonesy

$ mkdir /tmp/tmp
$ cd /tmp/tmp
$ touch 'a a'
$ /bin/ls | wc
1 2 4

Neither wc -l or wc -w works if you have files with white space.