NAME

       rename - renames multiple files

SYNOPSIS

       rename [ -h|-m|-V ] [ -v ] [ -0 ] [ -n ] [ -f ] [ -d ] [ -u [enc]]
       [ -e|-E perlexpr]*|perlexpr [ files ]

DESCRIPTION

       "rename" renames the filenames supplied according to the rule specified as the first
       argument.  The perlexpr argument is a Perl expression which is expected to modify the $_
       string in Perl for at least some of the filenames specified.  If a given filename is not
       modified by the expression, it will not be renamed.  If no filenames are given on the
       command line, filenames will be read via standard input.

   Examples (Larry Wall,  1992)
       For example, to rename all files matching "*.bak" to strip the extension, you might say

               rename 's/\.bak$//' *.bak

       To translate uppercase names to lower, you'd use

               rename 'y/A-Z/a-z/' *

   More examples (2020)
       You can also use rename to move files between directories, possibly at the same time as
       making other changes (but see --filename)

               rename 'y/A-Z/a-z/;s/^/my_new_dir\//' *.*

       You can also write the statements separately (see -e/-E)

               rename -E 'y/A-Z/a-z/' -E 's/^/my_new_dir\//' *.*

OPTIONS

       -v, --verbose
               Verbose: print names of files successfully renamed.

       -0, --null
               Use \0 as record separator when reading from STDIN.

       -n, --nono
               No action: print names of files to be renamed, but don't rename.

       -f, --force
               Over write: allow existing files to be over-written.

       --path, --fullpath
               Rename full path: including any directory component.  DEFAULT

       -d, --filename, --nopath, --nofullpath
               Do not rename directory: only rename filename component of path.

       -h, --help
               Help: print SYNOPSIS and OPTIONS.

       -m, --man
               Manual: print manual page.

       -V, --version
               Version: show version number.

       -u, --unicode [encoding]
               Treat filenames as perl (unicode) strings when running the user-supplied code.

               Decode/encode filenames using encoding, if present.

               encoding is optional: if omitted, the next argument should be an option starting
               with '-', for instance -e.

       -e      Expression: code to act on files name.

               May be repeated to build up code (like "perl -e").  If no -e, the first argument
               is used as code.

       -E      Statement: code to act on files name, as -e but terminated by ';'.

ENVIRONMENT

       No environment variables are used.

AUTHOR

       Larry Wall

SEE ALSO

       mv(1), perl(1)

DIAGNOSTICS

       If you give an invalid Perl expression you'll get a syntax error.

BUGS

       The original "rename" did not check for the existence of target filenames, so had to be
       used with care.