Unix – Make Directory Tree in a Swipe

Linux, Tips n Tricks

If I wanted to created a directory tree say /first/second/third this is how I used to do it, till now.

$ cd /
$ mkdir first
$ cd first
$ mkdir second
$ cd second
$ mkdir third
$ cd third

Today I learnt that you could do this in a single swipe using the -p option!

mkdir -p first/second/third

And its not just restricted to simple hierarchies, you could even create a complex tree structure like this

$ mkdir -p project/{lib/ext,bin,src,doc/{html,info,pdf},demo/stat/a}

You can find 9 more such interesting tips on the IBM post titled “Learn 10 good UNIX usage habits

Comments on this entry are closed.

  • rushita Feb 19, 2010 Link

    thanks it was helpful 🙂 xx

  • Sharat Chandran Nov 11, 2010 Link

    Hey Venu,

    This is awesome man!! Thanks a tonne. It really solved a biigg issue for me today!
    Thanks again!