linux args list too long error

Question

I'm trying to run this command, but get arg list too long error:

find /dir1/dir2/dir3/dir4/dir5 -name *.cdb -type f -mmin +30 -delete

Error is:

/usr/bin/find: Arg list too long.

Probably the find command returns too many files. Any suggestions on how to overcome this issue?

Thanks

Answer 1

First off, you should escape the asterisk to prevent the shell from expanding it:

find /dir1/dir2/dir3/dir4/dir5 -name \*.cdb -type f -mmin +30 -delete

or

find /dir1/dir2/dir3/dir4/dir5 -name '*.cdb' -type f -mmin +30 -delete

Answer 2

Bash globbing is expanding your *.cdb argument and you are sending too many arguments to the find command.

Try adding quotes to that argument to avoid shell expansion and pass the globbing task to the find command:

find /dir1/dir2/dir3/dir4/dir5 -name '*.cdb' -type f -mmin +30 -delete

If you still need to increment the maximum arguments limit, you can use ulimit -s :

ulimit -s 65536