Some shell newbies don't know this very handy file management related command so I decided to include it here. You need to have the "file" package installed. Show Sample Output

Schematics: command [options] [paste your variable here] parameter command [options] [paste entire column of variables here] parameter ... (hard-code command "c" and parameter "e" according to your wishes: in example shown command = "cp -a" and parameter = "~") Features: - Quick exchange only variable part of a long command line - Make variable part to be an entire column of data (i.e. file list) - Full control while processing every single item Hints: Paste column of data from anywhere. I.e. utilize the Block Select Mode to drag, select and copy columns (In KDE Konsole with Ctrl+Alt pressed, or only Ctrl pressed in GNOME Terminal respectively). Disadvantages: You can paste only one single variable in a row. If there are more space separated variables in a row only first one will be processed, but you can arrange your variables in a column instead. To transpose rows to columns or vice versa look at Linux manual pages for 'cut' and 'paste'. TODO: - add edit mode to vary command "c" and parameter "e" on the fly - add one edit mode more to handle every list item different - add y/n/a (=All) instead of only y(=default)/n to allowed answers Disclaimer: The code is not optimized, only the basic idea is presented here. It's up to you to shorten code or extend the functionality. Show Sample Output

Adds the stdout (standard output) to the beginning of logfile.txt. Change "command" to whatever command you like, such as 'ls' or 'date', etc. It does this by adding the output to a temporary file, then adding the previous contents of logfile.txt to the temp file, then copying the new contents back to the logfile.txt and removing the temp file.

Use find's built-in "exec" option to avoid having to do any weirdness with quoting.

Will move in that case every file in the current folder older than 30 days to the "old" folder Replace "mv $i old/" by any command such as rm / echo to do something different.

Use optimized sed to big file/stream to reduce execution time Use sed '/foo/ s/foo/foobar/g' <filename> insted of sed 's/foo/foobar/g' <filename>