FD(1)

NAME
fd - find entries in the filesystem

SYNOPSIS
fd [-HIEsiaLp0hV] [-d depth] [-t filetype] [-e ext] [-E exclude] [-c when] [-j num] [-x cmd] [pattern [path...]]

DESCRIPTION
fd is a simple, fast and user-friendly alternative to find(1).

By default fd uses regular expressions for the pattern. However, this can be changed to use simple glob patterns with the '--glob' option.

By default fd will exclude hidden files and directories, as well as any files that match gitignore rules or ignore rules in .ignore or .fdignore files.

If you wish to search all files in a specific directory, you can use '' or . as the search pattern, to match all files. Or you can use the '--search-path' option to specify the path(s) instead of the positional parameter.

Options may be given anywhere on the command line.

OPTIONS

-H, --hidden
    Include hidden files and directories in the search results (default: hidden files and directories are skipped). The flag can be overridden with '--no-hidden'.

    Ignored files are still excluded unless --no-ignore or --no-ignore-vcs is also used.

-I, --no-ignore
    Show search results from files and directories that would otherwise be ignored by

    •   .gitignore

    •   .git/info/exclude

    •   The global gitignore configuration (by default $HOME/.config/git/ignore)

    •   .ignore

    •   .fdignore

    •   The global fd ignore file (usually $HOME/.config/fd/ignore )

    The flag can be overridden with '--ignore'.

-u, --unrestricted
    Perform an unrestricted search, including ignored and hidden files. This is an alias for '--hidden --no-ignore'.

--no-ignore-vcs
    Show search results from files and directories that would otherwise be ignored by gitignore files including .gitignore, .git/info/exclude, and the global gitignore configuration (core.excludesFile git setting, which defaults to $HOME/.config/git/ignore). The flag can be overridden with '--ignore-vcs'.

--no-require-git
    Do not require a git repository to respect gitignores. By default, fd will only respect global gitignore rules, .gitignore rules and local exclude rules if fd detects that you are searching inside a git repository. This flag allows you to relax this restriction such that fd will respect all git related ignore rules regardless of whether you’re searching in a git repository or not. The flag can be overridden with '--require-git'.

--no-ignore-parent
    Show search results from files and directories that would otherwise be ignored by gitignore files in parent directories.

-s, --case-sensitive
    Perform a case-sensitive search. By default, fd uses case-insensitive searches, unless the pattern contains an uppercase character (smart case).

-i, --ignore-case
    Perform a case-insensitive search. By default, fd uses case-insensitive searches, unless the pattern contains an uppercase character (smart case).

-g, --glob
    Perform a glob-based search instead of a regular expression search. If combined with the '--full-path' option, '**' can be used to match multiple path components.

--regex
    Perform a regular-expression based search (default). This can be used to override --glob.

-F, --fixed-strings
    Treat the pattern as a literal string instead of a regular expression. Note that this also performs substring comparison. If you want to match on an exact filename, consider using '--glob'.

--and pattern
    Add additional required search patterns, all of which must be matched. Multiple additional patterns can be specified. The patterns are regular expressions, unless '--glob' or '--fixed-strings' is used.

-a, --absolute-path
    Shows the full path starting from the root as opposed to relative paths. The flag can be overridden with '--relative-path'.

-l, --list-details
    Use a detailed listing format like 'ls -l'. This is basically an alias for '--exec-batch ls -l' with some additional 'ls' options. This can be used to see more metadata, to show symlink targets and to achieve a deterministic sort order.

-L, --follow
    By default, fd does not descend into symlinked directories. Using this flag, symbolic links are also traversed. The flag can be overridden with '--no-follow'.

-p, --full-path
    By default, the search pattern is only matched against the filename (or directory name). Using this flag, the pattern is matched against the full path.

-0, --print0
    Separate search results by the null character (instead of newlines). Useful for piping results to xargs.

--max-results count
    Limit the number of search results to 'count' and quit immediately.

-1  Limit the search to a single result and quit immediately. This is an alias for '--max-results=1'.

-q, --quiet
    When the flag is present, the program does not print anything and will instead exit with a code of 0 if there is at least one search result. Otherwise, the exit code will be 1. This is mainly for usage in scripts and can be faster than checking for output because the search can be stopped early after the first match. --has-results can be used as an alias.

--show-errors
    Enable the display of filesystem errors for situations such as insufficient permissions or dead symlinks.

--strip-cwd-prefix [when]
    By default, relative paths are prefixed with './' when -x/--exec, -X/--exec-batch, or -0/--print0 are given, to reduce the risk of a path starting with '-' being treated as a command line option. Use this flag to change this behavior. If this flag is used without a value, it is equivalent to passing "always". Possible values are:

    never
        Never strip the ./ at the beginning of paths

    always
        Always strip the ./ at the beginning of paths

    auto
        Only strip if used with --exec, --exec-batch, or --print0. That is, it resets to the default behavior.

--one-file-system, --mount, --xdev
    By default, fd will traverse the file system tree as far as other options dictate. With this flag, fd ensures that it does not descend into a different file system than the one it started in. Comparable to the -mount or -xdev filters of find(1).

-h, --help
    Print help information.

-V, --version
    Print version information.

-d, --max-depth d
    Limit directory traversal to at most d levels of depth. By default, there is no limit on the search depth.

--min-depth d
    Only show search results starting at the given depth. See also: '--max-depth' and '--exact-depth'.

--exact-depth d
    Only show search results at the exact given depth. This is an alias for '--min-depth <depth> --max-depth <depth>'.

--prune
    Do not traverse into matching directories.

-t, --type filetype
    Filter search by type:

    f, file
        regular files

    d, dir, directory
        directories

    l, symlink
        symbolic links

    b, block-device
        block devices

    c, char-device
        character devices

    s, socket
        sockets

    p, pipe
        named pipes (FIFOs)

    x, executable
        executable (files)

    e, empty
        empty files or directories
    This option can be specified more than once to include multiple file types. Searching for '--type file --type symlink' will show both regular files as well as symlinks. Note that the 'executable' and 'empty' filters work differently: '--type executable' implies '--type file' by default. And '--type empty' searches for empty files and directories, unless either '--type file' or '--type directory' is specified in addition. Examples:
      - Only search for files:
          fd --type file …
          fd -tf …
      - Find both files and symlinks
          fd --type file --type symlink …
          fd -tf -tl …
      - Find executable files:
          fd --type executable
          fd -tx
      - Find empty files:
          fd --type empty --type file
          fd -te -tf
      - Find empty directories:
          fd --type empty --type directory
          fd -te -td

-e, --extension ext
    Filter search results by file extension ext. This option can be used repeatedly to allow for multiple possible file extensions. If you want to search for files without extension, you can use the regex '^[^.]+$' as a normal search pattern.

-E, --exclude pattern
    Exclude files/directories that match the given glob pattern. This overrides any other ignore logic. Multiple exclude patterns can be specified. Examples:
      --exclude '*.pyc'
      --exclude node_modules

--ignore-contain name
    Exclude directories that (directly) contain the given name. This option can be specified multiple times.

--ignore-file path
    Add a custom ignore-file in '.gitignore' format. These files have a low precedence.

-c, --color when
    Declare when to colorize search results:

    auto
        Colorize output when standard output is connected to terminal (default).

    never
        Do not colorize output.

    always
        Always colorize output.

--hyperlink
    Specify whether the output should use terminal escape codes to indicate a hyperlink to a file url pointing to the path. The value can be auto, always, or never. Currently, the default is "never", and if the option is used without an argument "auto" is used. In the future this may be changed to "auto" and "always".

    auto
        Only output hyperlinks if color is also enabled, as a proxy for whether terminal escape codes are acceptable.

    never
        Never output hyperlink escapes.

    always
        Always output hyperlink escapes, regardless of color settings.

-j, --threads num
    Set number of threads to use for searching & executing (default: number of available CPU cores).

-S, --size size
    Limit results based on the size of files using the format <+-><NUM><UNIT>

    '+' file size must be greater than or equal to this

    '-' file size must be less than or equal to this

    If neither '+' nor '-' is specified, file size must be exactly equal to this.

    'NUM'
        The numeric size (e.g. 500)

    'UNIT'
        The units for NUM. They are not case-sensitive. Allowed unit values:

        'b' bytes

        'k' kilobytes (base ten, 10^3 = 1000 bytes)

        'm' megabytes

        'g' gigabytes

        't' terabytes

        'ki'
            kibibytes (base two, 2^10 = 1024 bytes)

        'mi'
            mebibytes

        'gi'
            gibibytes

        'ti'
            tebibytes

--changed-within date|duration
    Filter results based on the file modification time. Files with modification timestamps greater than the argument will be returned. The argument can be provided as a duration (10h, 1d, 35min) or as a specific point in time as full RFC3339 format with time zone, as a date or datetime in the local time zone (YYYY-MM-DD or YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS), or as the prefix '@' followed by the number of seconds since the Unix epoch (@[0-9]+). --change-newer-than, --newer or --changed-after can be used as aliases. Examples:
      --changed-within 2weeks
      --change-newer-than "2018-10-27 10:00:00"
      --newer 2018-10-27
      --changed-after @1704067200

--changed-before date|duration
    Filter results based on the file modification time. Files with modification timestamps less than the argument will be returned. The argument can be provided as a duration (10h, 1d, 35min) or as a specific point in time as full RFC3339 format with time zone, as a date or datetime in the local time zone (YYYY-MM-DD or YYYY-MM-DD HH:MM:SS), or as the prefix '@' followed by the number of seconds since the Unix epoch (@[0-9]+). --change-older-than or --older can be used as aliases. Examples:
      --changed-before "2018-10-27 10:00:00"
      --change-older-than 2weeks
      --older @1704067200

-o, --owner [user][:group]
    Filter files by their user and/or group. Format: [(user|uid)][:(group|gid)]. Either side is optional. Precede either side with a '!' to exclude files instead. Examples:
      --owner john
      --owner :students
      --owner "!john:students"

-C, --base-directory path
    Change the current working directory of fd to the provided path. This means that search results will be shown with respect to the given base path. Note that relative paths which are passed to fd via the positional path argument or the --search-path option will also be resolved relative to this directory.

--path-separator separator
    Set the path separator to use when printing file paths. The default is the OS-specific separator ('/' on Unix, '\' on Windows).

--search-path search-path
    Provide paths to search as an alternative to the positional path argument. Changes the usage to 'fd [FLAGS/OPTIONS] --search-path PATH --search-path PATH2 [PATTERN]'

--format fmt
    Specify a template string that is used for printing a line for each file found. The following placeholders are substituted into the string for each file before printing:

    {}  path (of the current search result)

    {/} basename

    {//}
        parent directory

    {.} path without file extension

    {/.}
        basename without file extension

    {{  literal '{' (an escape sequence)

    }}  literal '}' (an escape sequence)

    Notice that you can use "{{" and "}}" to escape "{" and "}" respectively, which is especially useful if you need to include the literal text of one of the above placeholders.

-x, --exec command
    Execute command for each search result in parallel (use --threads=1 for sequential command execution). Note that all subsequent positional arguments are considered to be arguments to the command - not to fd. It is therefore recommended to place the -x/--exec option last. Alternatively, you can supply a ';' argument to end the argument list and continue with more fd options. Most shells require ';' to be escaped: '\;'. This option can be specified multiple times, in which case all commands are run for each file found, in the order they are provided. In that case, you must supply a ';' argument for all but the last commands. If parallelism is enabled, the order commands will be executed in is non-deterministic. And even with --threads=1, the order is determined by the operating system and may not be what you expect. Thus, it is recommended that you don't rely on any ordering of the results. Before executing the command, any placeholder patterns in the command are replaced with the corresponding values for the current file. The same placeholders are used as in the "--format" option. If no placeholder is present, an implicit "{}" at the end is assumed. If --print0 is also given, then a null character (\0) will be printed between the output for each found entry. This allows another program to easily distinguish the output for each file if the command(s) produce multiple lines. Examples:
      - find all *.zip files and unzip them:
            fd -e zip -x unzip
      - find *.h and *.cpp files and run "clang-format -i .." for each of them:
            fd -e h -e cpp -x clang-format -i
      - Convert all *.jpg files to *.png files:
            fd -e jpg -x convert {} {.}.png
      - Run stat for each *.txt file, separated by null characters
            fd -0 -e txt -x stat

-X, --exec-batch command
    Execute command once, with all search results as arguments. The order of the arguments is non-deterministic and should not be relied upon. This uses the same placeholders as "--format" and "--exec", but instead of expanding once per command invocation each argument containing a placeholder is expanding for every file in a batch and passed as separate arguments. If no placeholder is present, an implicit "{}" at the end is assumed. Like --exec, subsequent arguments are assumed to be part of command until either the end of command arguments or a ';' argument. See above. Like --exec, this can be used multiple times, in which case each command will be run in the order given. Examples:
      - Find all test_*.py files and open them in your favorite editor:
            fd -g 'test_*.py' -X vim
        Note that this executes a single "vim" process with all search results as arguments.
      - Find all *.rs files and count the lines with "wc -l ...":
            fd -e rs -X wc -l

--batch-size size
    Maximum number of arguments to pass to the command given with -X. If the number of results is greater than the given size, the command given with -X is run again with remaining arguments. A batch size of zero means there is no limit (default), but note that batching might still happen due to OS restrictions on the maximum length of command lines.

PATTERN SYNTAX
The regular expression syntax used by fd is documented here:
    https://docs.rs/regex/1.0.0/regex/#syntax The glob syntax is documented here:
    https://docs.rs/globset/#syntax

ENVIRONMENT

LS_COLORS
    Determines how to colorize search results, see dircolors(1).

NO_COLOR
    Disables colorized output.

XDG_CONFIG_HOME, HOME
    Used to locate the global ignore file. If XDG_CONFIG_HOME is set, use $XDG_CONFIG_HOME/fd/ignore. Otherwise, use $HOME/.config/fd/ignore.

FILES

.fdignore
    This file works similarly to a .gitignore file anywhere in the searched tree and specifies patterns that should be excluded from the search. However, this file is specific to fd, and will be used even if the --no-ignore-vcs option is used.

$XDG_CONFIG_HOME/fd/ignore
    Global ignore file. Unless ignore mode is turned off (such as with --no-ignore) ignore entries in this file will be ignored, as if it was an .fdignore file in the current directory.

EXAMPLES

Find files and directories that match the pattern 'needle':
    $ fd needle

Start a search in a given directory (/var/log):
    $ fd nginx /var/log

Find all Python files (all files with the extension .py) in the current directory:
    $ fd -e py

Open all search results with vim:
    $ fd pattern -X vim

Tips and Tricks

•   If you add ".git/" to your global ignore file ($XDG_CONFIG_HOME/fd/ignore), then ".git" folders will be ignored by default, even when the --hidden option is used.

•   You can use a shell alias or a wrapper script in order to pass desired flags to fd by default. For example if you do not like the default behavior of respecting gitignore, you can use `alias fd="/usr/bin/fd --no-ignore-vcs"` in your .bashrc to create an alias for fd that doesn't ignore git files by default.

BUGS
Bugs can be reported on GitHub: https://github.com/sharkdp/fd/issues

SEE ALSO
find(1)