Welcome to the monastery propellerhat! It would be great if you could provide us with a bit more context about yourself and your problem, including why you need to solve it:

• Are you an experienced Perl programmer or new to Perl?
• Which platform/s do you need your script to run on? Unix? (if so, which flavour?). Do you require that it runs on Windows too?

That will allow us to provide you with more helpful answers on how to get the most out of Perl's excellent File::Find module.

As indicated at Re^2: Unix shell versus Perl, Perl's File::Find module has many advantages compared to Unix shell and its find command. I also know from personal experience that File::Find is portable and works well under Windows too - though there are some pitfalls for the unwary, due to the underlying differences between Unix and Windows file systems.

File::Find References Added Later

• File::Find (perldoc)
• File::Find::Rule by Richard Clamp (CPAN)

• App::find2perl and find2perl by Leon Timmermans (CPAN) - script to translate Unix find command lines to Perl code

• Re: file modifications using file::find by kcott (2021) - complete and clear sample code using File::Find
• Re^3: file modifications using file::find (2021) - sample Perl code to find all .txt files under current working directory

• Re^3: Strictly nested sub warnings (2010) - sample Perl code to find all symlinks under $dir using File::Find
• Re^2: Unix shell versus Perl (2008) - performance of Perl File::Find vs Unix find command
• Properly newline terminate a bunch of files on Unix (2003) - performance of Perl File::Find vs Unix find/xargs

• find2perl with File::Find and -maxdepth by u914 (2002) - seeking advice on File::Find and find2perl

• how to use find() options by ypreisler (2024) - struggling to follow symbolic links (davido shows how)
• find () command does not process all symlinks by ypreisler (2024) - ... still struggling

• Re: How to create symlink using Perl? (Unix symlinks vs Windows Junctions)

See Also

• symlink (perldoc -f symlink)
• perlport (symlink)

• Re: Check for another program availability (Running External Processes on Unix and Windows References)
• Re^4: uparse - Parse Unicode strings (locate/find/xargs)
• Unix shell versus Perl

• Re-runnably editing a file in place
• Re: RFC: Self Assessment Perl (2018) - answers to sample interview questions
• File::Replace by haukex (CPAN)