100 Useful Command-Line Utilities

by Oliver; 2014

9. mv

To rename a file or directory we use mv:

$ mv file1 file2 

In a sense, this command also moves files, because we can rename a file into a different path. For example:

$ mv file1 dir1/dir2/file2

would move file1 into dir1/dir2/ and change its name to file2, while:

$ mv file1 dir1/dir2/

would simply move file1 into dir1/dir2/ (or, if you like, rename ./file1 as ./dir1/dir2/file1).

Swap the names of two files, a and b:

$ mv a a.1
$ mv b a
$ mv a.1 b

Change the extension of a file, test.txt, from .txt to .html:

$ mv test.txt test.html

Shortcut:

$ mv test.{txt,html}

mv can be dangerous because, if you move a file into a directory where a file of the same name exists, the latter will be overwritten. To prevent this, use the -n flag:

$ mv -n myfile mydir/ # move, unless "myfile" exists in "mydir"

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