Batch renaming files in OSX terminal

Question

I\'m trying to rename files e.g. screen-0001.tif to 0001.tif using the approach in this SO question:

for file in *.tif
do
  echo mv \"$         


        

Answer 1

Two things:

1. You're echoing the commands and not actually executing them. I will do this when I do massive renames just to make sure that the command works correctly. I can redirect the output to a file, and then use that file as a shell script.
2. The substitution is wrong. There are two ways:
   1. Left most filter ${file#screen-}.
   2. Substitution: ${file/screen/}

The name of the environment variable always goes first. Then the pattern type, then the pattern

Here's how I would do this:

$ for file in *.tif
> do
>   echo "mv '$file' '${file#screen-}'"
> done | tee mymove.sh   # Build a shell script 
$ vi mymove.sh           # Examine the shell script and make sure everything is correct
$ bash mymove.sh         # If all is good, execute the shell script.