Running multiple commands in one line in shell

Say I have a file /templates/apple and I want to

1. put it in two different places and then
2. remove the original.

So, /templates/apple will be copied to /templates/used AND /templates/inuse and then after that I’d like to remove the original.

Is cp the best way to do this, followed by rm? Or is there a better way?

I want to do it all in one line so I’m thinking it would look something like:

cp /templates/apple /templates/used | cp /templates/apple /templates/inuse | rm /templates/apple

Is this the correct syntax?

Solution 1:

You are using | (pipe) to direct the output of a command into another command. What you are looking for is && operator to execute the next command only if the previous one succeeded:

cp /templates/apple /templates/used && cp /templates/apple /templates/inuse && rm /templates/apple

Or

cp /templates/apple /templates/used && mv /templates/apple /templates/inuse

To summarize (non-exhaustively) bash's command operators/separators:

• | pipes (pipelines) the standard output (stdout) of one command into the standard input of another one. Note that stderr still goes into its default destination, whatever that happen to be.
• |&pipes both stdout and stderr of one command into the standard input of another one. Very useful, available in bash version 4 and above.
• && executes the right-hand command of && only if the previous one succeeded.
• || executes the right-hand command of || only it the previous one failed.
• ; executes the right-hand command of ; always regardless whether the previous command succeeded or failed. Unless set -e was previously invoked, which causes bash to fail on an error.

Solution 2:

Why not cp to location 1, then mv to location 2. This takes care of "removing" the original.

And no, it's not the correct syntax. | is used to "pipe" output from one program and turn it into input for the next program. What you want is ;, which seperates multiple commands.

cp file1 file2 ; cp file1 file3 ; rm file1

If you require that the individual commands MUST succeed before the next can be started, then you'd use && instead:

cp file1 file2 && cp file1 file3 && rm file1

That way, if either of the cp commands fails, the rm will not run.

Solution 3:

Note that cp A B; rm A is exactly mv A B. It'll be faster too, as you don't have to actually copy the bytes (assuming the destination is on the same filesystem), just rename the file. So you want cp A B; mv A C

Solution 4:

Another option is typing Ctrl+V Ctrl+J at the end of each command.

Example (replace # with Ctrl+V Ctrl+J):

$ echo 1#
echo 2#
echo 3

Output:

1
2
3

This will execute the commands regardless if previous ones failed.

Same as: echo 1; echo 2; echo 3

If you want to stop execution on failed commands, add && at the end of each line except the last one.

Example (replace # with Ctrl+V Ctrl+J):

$ echo 1 &&#
failed-command &&#
echo 2

Output:

1
failed-command: command not found

In zsh you can also use Alt+Enter or Esc+Enter instead of Ctrl+V Ctrl+J