Argument list too long error for rm, cp, mv commands

Question

I have several hundred PDFs under a directory in UNIX. The names of the PDFs are really long (approx. 60 chars).

When I try to delete all PDFs together using the fol

Answer 1

You could use a bash array:

files=(*.pdf)
for((I=0;I<${#files[@]};I+=1000)); do
    rm -f "${files[@]:I:1000}"
done

This way it will erase in batches of 1000 files per step.