Before diving into the scripting details, it’s essential to understand what we aim to accomplish. We want to create a script that accepts a directory name as an argument and outputs the total number of subdirectories within it. This script will be particularly useful for system administrators and developers who often need to assess directory structures quickly.
Step-by-Step Guide
Creating the Script
Open your preferred text editor and create a new file named count_subdirs.sh. This file will contain our script.
The Script Content
Copy and paste the following shell script into your new file:
#!/bin/bash
# Check if a directory name is provided as an argument
if [ "$#" -ne 1 ]; then
echo "Usage: $0 <directory_name>"
exit 1
fi
# Assign the directory name to a variable
DIR=$1
# Check if the provided argument is indeed a directory
if [ ! -d "$DIR" ]; then
echo "Error: $DIR is not a directory."
exit 1
fi
# Count the number of subdirectories
SUBDIR_COUNT=$(find "$DIR" -type d -mindepth 1 | wc -l)
# Output the result
echo "The total number of subdirectories in '$DIR' is: $SUBDIR_COUNT"Save and close the file.
Making the Script Executable
Run the following command in your shell to make the script executable:
chmod +x count_subdirs.sh
Running the Script
To execute the script, use the following command:
./count_subdirs.sh /freshers/src/viewcnt
Testing the Script
For testing purposes, let’s create a sample directory structure:
mkdir -p test_directory/{subdir1,subdir2,subdir3/{nested1,nested2}}
This command will create a directory named test_directory with two subdirectories and an additional subdirectory subdir3 containing two nested subdirectories.
Now run the script with the newly created test_directory as an argument:
./count_subdirs.sh test_directory
The output should be:
The total number of subdirectories in 'test_directory' is: 5
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