Argument List Too Long.md

Argument List TOo Long Error in Linux

Have you faced this error while writing shell scripts? For e.g. simpile command like rm *.txt, cp *txt dst/ etc. can throw this error.

Reason: It orrcurs because of ARG_MAX contant for each command-line arguments. The main problem is the use of "" there. As you know linux expands the "" into complete command argument and make intermediate expanded command-line stuff. Now this expanded command can go over limit than ARG_MAX allowed. Thus, the error occurs.

Solution:

1. Use For Loop: $ for f in /your/path/*txt; do rm $f; done $ for f in /your/path/*txt; do cp $f dst/; done

2. Use find command: $ find . -maxdepth 1 -name '*.pdf' -delete

I prefer Option 1 because it easy to read aAlthough it might be slower that option 2.