--changed-within with an absolute file path?

[xfzv]

% uname -o
GNU/Linux

% fd -V
fd 10.1.0

I'm currently using find in a Bash script to determine if a file was modified less than 60 minutes ago:

output="/path/to/filename.ext"
% find "$output" -mmin +60
/path/to/filename.ext

fd doesn't print anything:

output="/path/to/filename.ext"
% fd --changed-within=60min "$output"
% echo $?
0

This works:

% fd --changed-within=60min filename.ext /path/
/path/to/filename.ext  

but I'd like to keep using $output (absolute file path) if possible. Just wondering if that's possible.

Thanks.

[tmccombs]

The first argument to fd is a pattern, not a path.

You either need to do something like:

$ fd --changed-within=60min . "$output"

or

$ fd --changed-within=60min --search-path "$output"

[xfzv]

Doesn't work:

% output="/path/to/filename.ext"

% fd --changed-within=60min . "$output"
[fd error]: Search path '/path/to/filename.ext' is not a directory.
[fd error]: No valid search paths given.

% fd --changed-within=60min --search-path "$output"
[fd error]: Search path '/path/to/filename.ext' is not a directory.
[fd error]: No valid search paths given.

[tmccombs]

ah, yeah.

This isn't really what fd was designed for.

But you could do it with something like:

$ fd --changed-within=60min --fixed-strings "$(basename "$output")" "$(dirname "$output")"

[xfzv]

Nice trick with basename and dirname, I didn't think about it. Works!

Is --fixed-strings actually required though? It seems to also work without it, same with --glob instead. In my case, filename.ext only contains letters.

Thank you.

[tmccombs]

--fixed-strings is only necessary if your filename has special characters.

[xfzv]

Just as I thought, thank you for the confirmation.

[tavianator]

--fixed-strings is not perfect because it performs a substring match:

tavianator@tachyon $ touch foo foofoo
tavianator@tachyon $ output=foo
tavianator@tachyon $ fd --changed-within=60min --fixed-strings "$(basename "$output")" "$(dirname "$output")"
./foo
./foofoo

--glob is not perfect either because of special characters:

tavianator@tachyon $ touch 'a*a' abba
tavianator@tachyon $ output='a*a'
tavianator@tachyon $ fd --changed-within=60min --glob "$(basename "$output")" "$(dirname "$output")"
./a*a
./abba

If that matters, I think this works correctly in all cases:

tavianator@tachyon $ fd --changed-within=60min --exact-depth=1 --glob "$(basename -- "$output" | sed 's/./\\&/g')" "$(dirname -- "$output")"
./a*a

Basically making a*b into the glob \a\*\b.