For a simple little shell script which can test whether any directory on your system is empty or not, do the following.
$ vi empty.sh
And copy/paste the following script
# !/bin/bash
dir=$1
[ $# -eq 0 ] && { echo "Usage: $0 directory"; exit 2; }
[ ! -d "$dir" ] && { echo "$dir is not a directory."; exit 2; }
if find "$dir" -maxdepth 0 -empty | read;
then
echo "$dir empty."
else
echo "$dir not empty."
fi
Save the file
See Vim Editor for vi commands
chmod it to run as an exec
$ chmod +x empty.sh
Now test it out
$ ./empty.sh /proc returns
/proc not empty.
$ ./empty.sh /usr/bin returns
$ /usr/bin not empty. or a longer example
$ ./empty.sh /usr/share/fluxbox/styles returns
$ /usr/share/fluxbox/styles not empty.
Especially suitable for Servers as well as Desktops, it saves you browsing all the way round your system to see empty directories.
Obviously it is limited to just checking if a directory is empty or not, but shell scripting wizards can probably modify it to work with the shell if command.
A single command to find files only would be similar to
$ find "/tmp" -type f -exec echo Found file {} \;
Or for all contents
$ [ "$(ls -A /path/to/directory)" ] && echo "Not Empty" || echo "Empty"
The same with an example would be
$ [ "$(ls -A /usr/bin)" ] && echo "Not Empty" || echo "Empty"
Labels: Bash Script to test for Empty Folders, Centos 6, RHEL