Refactoring code with the command line (files, folders and possibly variables)

These are a few commands I use in situations where I can’t use Eclipse for refactoring my code, you can use them by replacing from and to with the names you want.

No need to remind you to take backups to prevent irreversible loss of data.

Rename files and folders

find . ! -path . -name '*' -exec bash -c 'echo $0 ${0/from/to}' {} \;

Rename variables

find . -type f -print | xargs sed -i 's/from/to/g'

Rename variables in bulk

find . -type f -print | xargs sed -i 's/from/to/g;s/foo/bar/g;s/FOO/BAR/g'

Posted

February 27, 2014

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Nabil

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3 responses to “Refactoring code with the command line (files, folders and possibly variables)”

Ayoub_ice

September 6, 2014

Maybe using sublime text can be a good refactoring tool instant of Eclipse.

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1. Nabil
  
  April 29, 2016
  
  Yes, you can get away with your IDE search/replace, PHPStorm/Rubymine/Webstorm and like have a great refactoring tool… Yet, nothing beats the speed and dangerousness of the command line.
  
  Reply
Sean

August 2, 2021

Thanks! Just started using sed for refactorings.

One thing to note: careful not to changes files in your source control private folders. i.e. .svn in my case.

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