NAME

       rename - rename files

SYNOPSIS

       rename [options] expression replacement file...

DESCRIPTION

       rename  will  rename the specified files by replacing the first occurrence of expression in their name by
       replacement.

OPTIONS

       -s, --symlink
              Do not rename a symlink but its target.

       -v, --verbose
              Show which files were renamed, if any.

       -n, --no-act
              Do not make any changes; add --verbose to see what would be made.

       -o, --no-overwrite
              Do not overwrite existing files.  When --symlink is active, do not overwrite symlinks pointing  to
              existing targets.

       -i, --interactive
              Ask before overwriting existing files.

       -V, --version
              Display version information and exit.

       -h, --help
              Display help text and exit.

EXAMPLES

       Given the files foo1, ..., foo9, foo10, ..., foo278, the commands

              rename foo foo00 foo?
              rename foo foo0 foo??

       will turn them into foo001, ..., foo009, foo010, ..., foo278.  And

              rename .htm .html *.htm

       will fix the extension of your html files.  Provide an empty string for shortening:

              rename '_with_long_name' '' file_with_long_name.*

       will remove the substring in the filenames.

WARNING

       The renaming has no safeguards by default or without any one of the options --no-overwrite, --interactive
       or  --no-act.   If  the  user  has  permission to rewrite file names, the command will perform the action
       without any questions.  For example, the result can be quite drastic when the command is run as  root  in
       the  /lib directory.  Always make a backup before running the command, unless you truly know what you are
       doing.

INTERACTIVE MODE

       As most standard utilities rename can be used with a terminal device (tty in short)  in  canonical  mode,
       where  the  line  is buffered by the tty and you press ENTER to validate the user input.  If you put your
       tty in cbreak mode however, rename requires only a single key press to answer the prompt.  To set  cbreak
       mode, run for example:

              sh -c 'stty -icanon min 1; "$0" "$@"; stty icanon' rename -i from to files

EXIT STATUS

              0      all requested rename operations were successful
              1      all rename operations failed
              2      some rename operations failed
              4      nothing was renamed
              64     unanticipated error occurred

SEE ALSO

       mv(1)

AVAILABILITY

       The    rename    command    is    part    of    the    util-linux   package   and   is   available   from
       https://www.kernel.org/pub/linux/utils/util-linux/.

util-linux                                          June 2011                                          RENAME(1)